


martinis, girls & guns

by scriveyner (trismegistus)



Series: Voltron Fic Collection [5]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Espionage, Multi, NaNoWriMo, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-01
Updated: 2016-11-24
Packaged: 2018-08-28 10:44:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 27,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8442817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trismegistus/pseuds/scriveyner
Summary: Hunk rolled his eyes, hands still on his hips. He looked down at the dark-haired man, who had a small bit of blood leaking from his nose, and then he toed the body. "So who is this, and why'd you piss him off?"

  NaNoWriMo 2016 entry,  fic is ongoing.





	1. Chapter 1

The heady stench of smoke and sweat that permeated this casino was nauseating at three in the morning. A tiny, underground and quite illegal operation, the gambling den sat open-faced to the water, shutters thrown open wide in the vain hopes of catching a slight breeze off the bay. The night air itself was stagnant and thick, but the heat and stink did not seem to deter those caught in the throes of pissing their money away.

Lance was tired. He knew this fact well, he had been on the ground running for the past eighteen hours; playing a high stakes game of hide-and-seek across two different country's borders before the trail led here, a seedy joint in a seedy seaside town full of mercenaries, mafia, and oil money. He relaxed against the bar, a low ball glass by his hand as he discretely watched the comings and goings around him through the reflection of the yellow-tinted mirror behind the bar.

A long day, a long week, and even more long days ahead. He thought wistfully of a bed, of air conditioning, of a bath to wash off the sweat and grime instead of a quick towel-off in the bathroom before changing clothes, and took another sip from the amber liquid that burned in the right ways as it slid down his throat.

The target of his attention hadn't moved in some time, seated at a card table, his back to Lance. Lance had made a circuitous route of the small casino, before settling up at the bar next to a lanky, gorgeous woman in a sarong. She moved as soon as he settled, which was a pity; a creature as beautiful as that was a sight for sore eyes when he'd been among the worst of humanity for days on end.

There was no wire here, no tilting his head to obscure the quick touch of finger to ear to confirm instructions, to acknowledge a plan – even with all his tricks of the trade an earpiece was a death warrant in a place like this. He was on his own tonight, and that was fine with him.

The woman in the patterned sarong was making her way around the room in much the same pattern he had an hour earlier, watching the players around each game, the stem of a martini glass held delicately between her fingers. He watched her for a while in the reflection as she hovered around the roulette table. Her long hair was pinned up, to keep it from clinging to the back of her neck with sweat, and the intricate updo left trailing, pale wisps around her face. Lance shifted a little to get a better view and as he did so someone else stepped up to the bar beside him.

He was dressed not dissimilar to the rest of the casino's gamblers; open collared shirt and bermuda shorts, sunglasses that hadn't been needed in hours hooked into the pocket of the tailored shirt. He didn't even spare Lance a glance as he ordered his whiskey from the bartender, but he moved with the confidence of someone who wasn't the slightest bit worried of his surroundings, that no matter what no one would be a threat.

Lance's skin prickled. He was _dangerous_.

Everyone carried, in the casino. There was a sign on the wall that contained the shutters that prohibited in four languages (five, if you counted the picture itself) the use or possession of weapons; not a single person in the building was unarmed. You didn't walk around with the kind of cash these people were dropping without hired muscle, and that hired muscle better be well-armed.

The dark-haired man glanced in Lance's direction while the bartender had his back to them both, and caught Lance looking. Lance gave him a nod of acknowledgment, before glancing back out to the floor of the casino, looking for the one bright spot amid the filthy, sweating men.

When he turned back to the bar, the dark-haired man was still staring at him, but now with a low ball glass at his hand. He knew Lance was out of place here, that this was his first night in the casino, in town, and he was trying to suss out Lance's motive, if he wasn't throwing his money away at the card tables, why was he here? It certainly wasn't for the atmosphere.

Lance knocked back the last of his drink, his air unconcerned. He left the glass on the bar and stood; acutely aware of the eyes on him now. The man at the bar made no attempts to be covert, and Lance was doing his damnedest to be as unconcerned about the attention on him as he could be. His target was still sitting at the card table, a healthy pile of chips at his elbow. As Lance passed the table, his target lifted his head and caught Lance's eye, and that was the moment that Lance knew for certain that his cover was blown.

She was standing by the roulette wheel still, when Lance stopped beside it. The woman in the blue, patterned sarong had attached herself to the arm of a thickset man who seemed to have more hair spilling from the unbuttoned collar of his shirt than atop his head. Lance didn't look at her, but stared at the wheel as the attendant dropped the ball onto its spinning surface. He knew when he looked up she would look away, because she had come in that evening on the arm of the man at the card table. All he could do now was make a quiet exit in the hopes that no one was interested in making a scene.

As he stood by the wheel, Lance felt the cool, hard shape of the muzzle of a gun press into his side. "Let's go for a walk," a soft voice said at his ear, and when Lance looked over at the woman in the blue sarong, she was pointing to the roulette wheel, and not looking at him.

 

* * *

 

The street outside the casino would be deserted at this point in the day, when the too-late transitioned into the too-early. The sky was still dark, the water calm and the air sweet after the stagnant stink of the cramped casino. This sort of place did not have a valet, although there was what basically stood for a bouncer at the entrance. The burly man did not even look at Lance as he was walked out the door; he probably saw debts fulfilled in many ways throughout the night and knew when to not get involved.

Lance was walked across the cobblestone street, past the barrier that separated street from the sandy slope that led to the beach. He couldn't believe his luck, and kept moving sedately as the man prodded him forward. "I don't know what you think's going on," Lance said, keeping his hands where his captor could see them, "but I think you've got the wrong guy, buddy."

"You've been watching my partner all night, _buddy_ ," the sarcastic clip to the man's English let slip a faint accent. Lance took a few steps forward, his loafers sinking in the soft sand, and turned, his hands still held up. The man from the bar held his weapon close to him, elbow tucked to his side, both to conceal the gun and keep it from an easy spin and grab. Professional in some aspects, but not enough.

"Of course I have," Lance said. "He's a specimen, especially compared to most of the people in there." Lance spanned his hands, estimating the breadth of shoulders. "He must be a fantastic fuck."

A confused expression flitted across the gunman's face, like he wasn't quite certain what to make of that; but it was only an instant and it was gone, the gun still pointed squarely at Lance.

"Wait, wait," Lance said, taking another step back. The sand was hardening up beneath his feet, getting closer to where the waves very lazily lapped at the shore. "Don't shoot, man, I'll tell you anything you want to know!"

"Who do you work for, then?" the dark-haired man said.

"That guy," Lance said, and inclined his head.

The dark-haired man didn't even have time to twist entirely around; the punch clocked him so hard he dropped like a sack of wet cement. Hunk kicked the gun away, scattering sand, and glared at Lance, both hands on his hips. "So you're working for me, now?"

Lance retrieved the gun and then turned, winging it into the water. The weapon made a satisfying plink as it disappeared under the waves. "Yeah, so I want updated dental," Lance said. "Also, I'm being sexually harassed by my coworker. You know the one."

Hunk rolled his eyes, hands still on his hips. He looked down at the dark-haired man, who had a small bit of blood leaking from his nose, and then he toed the body. "Who's this, and why'd you piss him off?"

"I'll explain on the way," Lance said. "He'll be useful, he said he's partners with our target."

"Hey, man. We don't _do_ prisoners."

"Yeah, well, I'm making an exception." Lance rolled the guy over and held out his hand. Hunk sighed dramatically and produced a zip tie, so that Lance could incapacitate him.

"Pidge is going to have a coronary," Hunk said, as he picked up the unconscious man and put him easily over his shoulder.

"Pidge will deal," Lance said, and glanced out over the water. "My cover's blown, anyway; let's get back to base."

Neither of the two men noticed the woman in the blue sarong standing at the divider, her hands resting atop the wooden barrier, watching them.

 


	2. Chapter 2

The building was much like many of the others that lined the shore; squat and long with large shutters that could open to the sea. Just like the underground casino and most of the other buildings there was a distinct lack of air conditioning, a fact that Lance lamented silently as he pushed open the door to what was once a bedroom.

It was still, technically a bedroom – although the bed itself was barely visible under a pile of opened cases and loose technology. Along the far edge of the bed, facing the half-closed shutters was a line of computer monitors of all sizes. They cast the only illumination in the room, a sickly green reflected light that made even the most healthy look like a pallid zombie. Before he had even let the door drift shut behind him, a tousled head wearing oversized glasses popped up from the far side of the bed, eyes obscured by the reflection on the lenses.

"Absolutely _not_ ," Pidge said in no uncertain terms as Lance walked around the bed.

"Last I checked, I was put in charge of this thing," Lance said, arms folded.

Pidge was seated cross-legged on the floor, surrounded by a wealth of monitors, an open styrofoam container that stank of day-old local cuisine and at least fifteen bottles, some of which were half full. She wore a loose camisole top and cutoffs and an expression as sour as if she had been sucking on a lemon the whole evening. "Bringing _anyone_ here is a major security breach, Lance! I'll have to report it!"

Lance shrugged loosely. There was protocol and then there was _protocol_ , and they'd been given carte blanche to get the job done and bring their target in.

The monitors behind Pidge showed a spread of wireless security cameras that had been installed across the suite; three bedrooms and a common area. The hotel had an array of similar high-class suites scattered along the waterfront, with smaller cabanas situated between the larger ones. The only movement on the camera was Hunk, tying their new friend to a chair.

"Any luck on your end, then?" Lance asked because Pidge was in a fine old mood.

"Nothing." Pidge half-turned to her monitors and pressed a key. The dossier she had up popped to the forefront of all the windows on the screen; showing a few blurry pictures of their target taken earlier in the month, in Cairo. "Every lead that I could tease out of the dossier ended in one of the photographs can be put on a rough timeline, but there's no commonality." Pidge huffed out an annoyed noise and she leaned forward, twisting one of the screens in Lance's direction.

It was a blurry picture in market; sun and dust and a crush of people made picking out the individuals all the much more difficult. The target was circled, though – and beside him, shorter, dark hair – was the person they had trussed up like the Christmas turkey in the common area. Lance jabbed his finger at the screen, not at the target but at the other man. "That's him."

"The guy who got the drop on you?" Pidge swiveled the screen back to herself and shoved her glasses up her nose with her middle finger. She studied the image thoughtfully, then looked up at Lance. "You're not any good at torture, you should let me or Hunk handle that."

Lance blanched a little, then a frown settled on his face. "Maybe we won't have to resort to torture, Pidge, did you ever think of that?"

"We also shouldn't be using our names around a prisoner, either," Pidge said, completely ignoring Lance. She typed a few things on the keyboard that lay across her lap, staring intently at the screen. The imaging program refocused its attention on the dark-haired man, scanning known person of interest databases.

"My cover has been blown, too." Lance watched Pidge busy herself with her equipment. "You'll need to handle the next surveillance op," he said. "Our target will be looking for me."

"Understood," Pidge said. "Go away now, I'm working."

Lance rolled his eyes exaggeratedly but didn't say anything else, letting himself out of the dark and stuffy room.

 

* * *

 

Hunk was sitting on the couch, one arm over the back of the couch, his legs crossed loosely and a pistol on his knee. He was watching their prisoner, who was tied to a straight-backed chair sacrificed from the table near the tiny kitchenette the suite provided. He nodded to Lance, who secured the door to Pidge's command center behind him, and Lance inclined his head toward the patio. Wordlessly, Hunk rose from his seat, and they both stepped outside.

"I need a cigarette," Lance said, and Hunk shook his head as he tucked his pistol into the waistband of his shorts.

"You don't," he said. "What's the verdict?"

"Pidge is pissed, Pidge will deal." Lance folded his arms again and looked out at the sea, dark and formless in the early morning. At the very edge of the horizon the sky was lightening, morning was on its way. "Some of the surveillance images from the incident in Cairo do show our buddy with the target. We're gonna need information out of him, and soon."

Hunk nodded his head again. "Any suggestions on how to get it?" he asked.

"We set Pidge loose on him," Lance wasn't looking at Hunk, but staring out at the water, his brow furrowed as he thought. "Could really use that smoke," he muttered. "Helps get my brain in order." There was clearly something bothering him still, and he couldn't quite grasp the tail end of the thought. Hunk was watching him with some mild concern, and finally Hunk stepped a little forward and rested his hand on Lance's shoulder.

Lance stiffened up just a bit, as Hunk leaned in close to him. "You're exhausted," Hunk said, from too close to be friendly. "Have you even had any time to rest since the airport?"

He pushed Hunk away, thankful that the darkness would hide the flush the close contact would have elicited otherwise. "I can sleep later," he said. "There's too much at stake right now."

"Dude, this is a surveillance job at the moment. We're just waiting for him to make contact with one of the rebel or terrorist groups before we move in. They need the solid intel to make any kind of conviction stick." Hunk let Lance push him back a step but didn't take his hand from Lance's shoulder. "No one's shooting at us, no one's hunting us; take a break."

Lance groaned. "First no smokes, then enforced nap breaks." He lifted Hunk's hand from his shoulder. "All right, all right," he said. "If I take a short siesta will you lay off it for a while?"

Hunk's brow was furrowed with clear concern. "You're our leader here, Lance," he said. "I know you think it means you have to do everything yourself, but you need to take care of yourself so you're fit _to_ lead."

Lance looked away from Hunk, out at the water again. The sky had lightened incrementally now, and some of the wave crests were starting to glitter. He nodded his head and looked back at Hunk. "Wake me up when the prisoner wakes," he said, and Hunk nodded his head once in return, as Lance let himself back into the suite.

 

* * *

 

Sunlight was beginning to creep along the patio itself; whispering hints of the heat that would scorch the later part of the day when Lance sat up, weapon in hand. He had heard the soft click of a door, and it was enough that he rose to his feet and crept along the sweep of the bed to his bedroom door, before easing it open slowly.

Hunk was not in the common area. The prisoner still was, though his head was up and he was looking the opposite direction of Lance's door. He was trying to assess an escape route. Gun in hand, Lance opened the door the rest of the way, and the soft whine of the hinges made his captive turn toward him, eyes narrowed.

Lance kept his gun on him, but he smiled in a thin, watery way. "Hello, Keith," he said. As expected the name did not elicit a response from the prisoner, and he walked out into the common area, seating himself on the edge of the couch and stifling a yawn. "Where'd your guard go?"

"To get breakfast." Keith's voice was scratchy with disuse. His hair was mussed and the blood from his nose had dried in a streak across his face. He was staring at Keith with the same narrowed eye expression that Lance remembered from the training videos; and Lance wasn't particularly moved.

"I don't think the others have recognized you," Lance said. "Well, Pidge will, once the system identifies you. That mullet isn't fooling me, though." He sat back a little, leaning his weight back into the couch cushions. "Keith, the rogue agent. You were killed in action eighteen months ago."

"Funny that," Keith said, his eyes not on Lance but on Lance's weapon. "It's interesting how all the attention goes away once you're dead, isn't it?" He shifted his head to one side and squinted at Lance. "I knew I recognized you," he said in that hoarse, slightly-accented voice. "I knew you were going to be trouble." He fell into a sullen silence then, brows drawn together.

Lance inclined his head a little. "If you cooperate with us in bringing in our target, I won't turn you in to the Garrison," he said. "You're already a ghost in their ledger."

"Nobody likes loose ends, let alone an agent from the Garrison," Keith snorted. "If you're going to kill me, just get it over with." He twisted his head quickly, and a few seconds later Pidge's door opened. She was wearing more clothes then when Lance had barged into her sanctuary, but not enough to mask her form.

"Ah," Pidge said, taking in Lance's dressing gown and the woken prisoner. She held a datapad in her hand, a picture of Keith's face on it. "I've got the intel," she said. "We've got a dead man on our hands."

"For a dead man he sure is pretty talkative," Lance said in amusement. "But not cooperative."

"Well we'll definitely have to do something about that," Pidge said, settling one hand on her hip and looking over their captive, an unsettling grin on her face. "I can be pretty persuasive."


	3. Chapter 3

'The Garrison' was a term bandied about by agents and operatives, and mostly referred to the old military barracks that had been secretly converted into staging areas for covert military operations after the end of the war. Set out in the desert a civilian had to be _quite_ determined to stumble upon the complex in the first place; and if they did they would be greeted by an old, crumbling and lazily active military base. That was enough for most, but the occasional paranoid conspiracy types would have to be ushered away by bored-looking MPs.

Lance hated it there.

He had been recruited; just like everyone else, but there was just something off about the entire place. He'd never been a fan of the desert; the way the dry heat baked into your skin and hair, the unbroken bleakness of the landscape, the solitude. Once activated he made it a solid point to spend as much time away as possible, only returning for mission debriefings at the behest of the head of operations.

Nobody knew the full scale of the operation here. They knew whose soil the military base was constructed on; they knew the names and faces of the people around them and their contact networks, and that was it. Everything was on a need-to-know basis ... and most people simply didn't need to know. It wasn't important what governments had vested interests and made contributions to the military slush fund that financed the Garrison, the only thing that mattered was the mission you were handed.

Lance leaned back against a low metal table in the converted barracks, arms folded as he watched the bustle around him. He'd been summoned; called away from a cabana on a sandy beach where the sky was blue, the sand was white and the sea turquoise to this desolate bunker in an arid desert and he was not a happy camper. He liked working alone. Preferred it, really.

"Lance!"

Well, most of the time.

The sprawl of tables and electronics made the room akin to a maze. Lance didn't see the speaker until he was almost upon him; although he'd recognized the voice and it had lightened his mood considerably. Lance stood up, unfolding his arms as Hunk came around the last set of obstacles.

It had been half a year and change, and while Hunk was grinning at seeing his old friend there was still a momentary hesitation when he saw Lance. Lance inclined his head, grinning, and that dispelled the awkwardness as Hunk strode boldly too him and threw his arms around Lance. "Where the fuck have you been?" Hunk said, not yelling but not keeping his voice down, either. He actually lifted Lance off his feed with the strength of the embrace, and Lance smacked his one free hand on Hunk's chest in a vain effort to worm free.

"As far away from this place as I could manage," Lance said when Hunk released him. They'd both flushed slightly at the contact, and Hunk's hand lingered just a moment on Lance's shoulder as he helped straighten his shirt. Lance very purposefully ignored that. "How's the arm?"

"Oh," Hunk said, and held up his left arm, flexing it. "Good as new." He was wearing BDUs like most who stayed on base, to help preserve the image of a budget-slashed military base, although the uniform's jacket had been left somewhere so he was left in a black tee shirt and trousers. Hunk smacked his bicep with one hand. "Just a few new scars to add to the collection."

Lance nodded his head and very purposefully ignored the memory of a blood-soaked shirt and screams. "You've gotta come see this place I was staying at," Lance said. "Nothing to think about except the sun and the surf."

There was another hesitation on Hunk's face, something quick that moved across his expression and Lance recognized all too well. He ignored that, too.

"Iverson sent for you too, huh?"

Lance turned around to see Pidge seated, cross-legged on the same metal table he'd been leaning against before Hunk showed up. She was wearing BDUs too, properly, unlike Hunk, hat and all. "Aww, Pidge," Lance said. "You've gotten taller since I saw you last!"

Pidge propped her elbow on one knee and cocked an eyebrow, looking Lance up and down slowly. "So how'd the result of that last STD screening turn out?" she inquired, tapping one finger on the tablet balanced on her other knee. "Shall we take a look?"

" _Pidge_ ," Hunk said, and she shrugged loosely. Then she straightened quickly, sliding off the table and disappearing her probably quite-illegal tablet into one of the many large pockets on the uniform. Lance turned around expectantly, as the operations chief came around into the small secluded pocket created by the maze of shelves and tables.

The woman was in her late fifties; hair mostly grey with some strands of color still threaded through and visible even in the tight bun that held her hair away from her face. This clearly wasn't Iverson, and Lance cast a questioning look at Hunk, who inclined his head and nodded just a little. _I'll explain later._

"It was easier to call you here than risk a communique into the field," the woman began, setting a thin white folder on the metal table. "We don't have a lot of time, this situation is quite urgent and the less data that is on the wire the less information will leak." She tapped the white folder once, and after a moment the entire length of the metal table shimmered and went translucent, turning into a large screen.

Both of Lance's eyebrows raised. That was an upgrade. "Yeah, excuse me," he said, and set one hand on the table, leaning forward on it so he could stare levelly across the table at the woman. "Who are you, again?"

There was a long moment of silence that was punctuated by a low, annoyed noise that came from Hunk.

"I am your commanding officer," she said in a crisp voice. "Perhaps if you spent a little less time on the beach the sun wouldn't have baked your brain into shit, McClain."

"Special Agent," Lance corrected, and this time Pidge's groan was audible and Hunk said something under his breath in another language.

"McClain, there is nothing special or unique about the skill set that you bring to this Agency. It would take me absolutely less effort to replace you than it would for you to empty the cum-soaked tissues in the trashcan next to your bed. Do we understand each other?"

Lance straightened slowly and folded his arms. He said nothing, and the grey-haired woman nodded her head once. "That's what I thought," she said, and tapped the white folder with two fingers, sliding it into the middle of the table. The soft illumination emanating from the table's surface outlined the folder in thick white, before it scanned the contents and displayed across its entire length.

It was a deconstructed dossier. Entire pages were shown, although there were plenty of strips of redaction, both blacked out and blurred. Pidge moved forward, beside Lance, staring down at the table's display with wide eyes.

"Hey, this is that Agent that disappeared a few years ago," Hunk said. "Didn't they fish his body out of a river?"

Lance was staring at the photograph. Two years ago he had just been graduating the Garrison's equivalent of basic training; but he remembered the uproar. "Was it even his body that they found?" he asked the woman.

She shook her head once. "Two and a half years ago two agents disappeared on a highly classified mission." She tapped the table and the two photographs appeared side by side; one looked strikingly like Pidge. So much so, Hunk and Lance exchanged a look and then glanced over at Pidge, who was staring at the photographs with a strained expression.

"Takashi Shirogane and Matthew Holt vanished into thin air," she said. "Three months after they failed to check in with their liaison, a body that was identified as Shirogane's was pulled out of a river in a major metropolitan area." She ran her fingers along the edge of the table and the pictures shrank to a corner while autopsy photos suddenly appeared. Lance bit the inside of his cheek and forced himself not to look away.

Bodies left in rivers for any length of time didn't come out cleanly, and they were looking at a mostly unidentifiable mess. Pidge looked up at the woman. "This isn't in-house," she said. "This is a local medical examiner, isn't it?" Certain she was correct, Pidge just kept going. "How did they correctly identify the body without access to our database of DNA and dental records?"

Hunk said, quietly, "they didn't question the findings because it's easier to write him off as dead than missing."

"Missing _is_ dead, in this line of work," Lance said. "Agents disappear all the _time_. What makes these two so special?"

"Because Takashi Shirogane resurfaced three weeks ago," the woman said, and swiped again.

The photographs were not the best quality, the focus was on someone else in frame, a foreign dignitary. Pidge pointed to the far corner, two dark-haired men and a woman with pale hair, blurry and hard to distinguish from the rest of the crowd. "That's them," she said. "Well, Shirogane."

"The mission that Shirogane and Holt were on is still classified to the highest levels," their commanding officer said. "It doesn't matter what mission they were on, what matters is that Shirogane is dealt with."

"Dealt with," Hunk said. "Not brought back?"

" _Dealt with_ ," the woman said. "We have reason to believe he has been compromised. There is a kill order out on him, and Holt, were Holt to resurface as well." She lifted her hand and, after a moment, the table's surface went dark. Lance picked up the white folder and opened it; it had no mission details aside from their updated passport information.

"We'll take care of it," Lance said, and closed the folder.

* * *

  
Keith hung his head forward and worked his jaw around. His restraints were tied really, really well -- he wasn't going anywhere. Even if he still had it tucked away he wouldn't be able to reach his trusty knife. If the big guy threw it away, he was going to be _really_ pissed.

He had no idea how long he'd been out, or how far away from casino he was. Hopefully, the others had noticed his absence and went into emergency mode; that would put them on the train over the border by lunchtime. He just had to keep these idiots busy until then. After that, well ... it didn't really matter any more, did it?

Keith lifted his head a little and squinted. Since the sun came up he could hear the seabirds. The entire city was infested with them, but the ocean air was crisp and close, so they weren't far from the beach. That gave him little to go on, the city had klicks of coastal property. They could be up the street, or on the other side of the bay.

The small one had mumbled something about putting together a bag of tricks, but instead of disappearing back into the room they had moseyed over to the kitchen area, and put on coffee. He turned his head to watch a bit, realized that the man on the couch was watching him, and then put his attention back on him.

He remembered Lance vaguely. Brown hair, brown skin, always wearing a goofy expression despite having the shit kicked out of him in basic. He figured that recruit would wash like most of the others; so imagine his surprise to see Lance sitting at a bar in the shittiest money sink Shiro could find.

They'd popped up on the Garrison's radar. It was only a matter of time; they all knew that. Somehow, Keith thought there would be more time, but luck wasn't infinite.

Lance had ditched the dressing gown when the sun came up in its full force, returning to a collared shirt and loose trousers. He had resumed his spot on the couch, pistol trained on Keith as if the big guy hadn't tied Keith's restraints so tight that he was starting to lose the blood flow to his hands.

"It got around the place fast that you'd been KIA," Lance said idly, arm hooked over the back of the couch. "Shot by a cartel was the version I heard. Was there ever any truth to it?"

"Depends on who you ask." Keith's voice was raw, his throat was dry. He didn't want to give any Garrison agents intel they didn't already have, but if he didn't appear at least a little cooperative he wouldn't buy enough time for Shiro and the princess to cross the border. "It wasn't my idea."

"Mm." Lance leaned back a little, looking to the kitchen. "Hey, green panties. Wanna check in with the big guy and make sure everything's clear? The lack of contact is unsettling."

" _What_ did you just call me?" Pidge said, stepping out of the kitchenette and looking a fair bit murderous.

"Green," Lance said. "With little grey kittens on them, really, are you fourteen or something?"

Pidge scowled at Lance. "You're a fucking pervert, McClain. Can I start on him yet? I've got the water boiling."

"We'll wait on Hunk," Lance said, giving up on code names entirely with a sigh and looking at Keith imploringly, as if Keith would have any sympathy for the man who had him at the end of a gun.

Pidge rolled her eyes and crossed the room carrying a mug in two hands. "You know where to find me, when you're ready. There's a shit-ton of plastic sheets in the closet in my room, we should put some down before we get to work."

Keith wet his lips and exhaled, curling his hands as best he could with his restraints, and looked past Lance to the small patch of blue sky he could see outside the shutters. He'd buy as much time as he could.

 


	4. Chapter 4

There were new vehicles on the street when Hunk turned the corner, a brown bag balanced on his hip. The cobblestone street was old, older than the city around it; the last vestiges of an old and great empire and was not particularly made for the carriage of modern transportation. It didn't stop people, of course -- and there had been several cars left parked along the curb that rose alongside the cobblestones. Hunk had made note of those when he passed earlier, the same vehicles that were there the night before, other patrons of the hotel's individual cabanas alongside the stretch of sea.

Now there were new vehicles.

It was a varied mix of cars, both foreign and sleek and worth more than Hunk's entire yearly salary and models that were older and beaters, relics of the last war to be fought in the region. There were two vans along the opposite side of the road. Those were where the trouble lay.

He slid in the door of the cabana and locked it behind him.

Lance was seated on the edge of a couch cushion, awake and dressed despite being before noon; an impressive feat for him. He acknowledged Hunk with a nod and a head tilt, indicating their prisoner, whose head had turned at Hunk's entrance.

Hunk glanced over the scene and put the paper bag on the bar counter that separated the kitchenette from the rest of the cabana, then walked briskly past Lance. "We have trouble," he said briefly, before disappearing into the room he was sharing with Lance.

He heard Lance get to his feet in the main part of the room but ignored it, grabbing the large black bag from under the bed and dropping it atop the mess of covers. "Trouble?" Lance said, hanging in the doorway, both hands on the door's frame and head tilted.

"Two unmarked vans worth," Hunk said as he checked the cartridge on a hand gun and set it aside. "Didn't I tell you it was a bad idea to bring him back here? Now  _ all _ our covers are blown, not just yours."

Lance stared at him, jaw set as he watched Hunk work. Then he pushed himself out of the door frame and spun on his heel, headed toward the other end of the cabana. "Pidge!" he barked. "Trouble!"

"No shit." She had emerged from her den fully dressed in nondescript clothes, a small backpack of her most important tech on. She looked over at their prisoner. "So they've come for you," she said. "Tracker in your shoe? Or under your skin?"

Keith was twisting in his restraints, tilted forward. "They're not here for me," he said, trying obviously to work something free.

Lance squinted, and cocked his head. "Of course they're here for you," he said, as if he was explaining it to a child.

"Not in the way you're thinking," Keith spat out. "They'll kill me, just like they'll kill you, and everything's gone to shit anyway." He rocked himself forward and almost toppled the chair he was bound to. "Fuck!"

Lance stopped in front of the chair. "You have thirty seconds to explain," he said, leaning in and catching the back of the chair so Keith couldn't rock it forward again.

Keith looked up at him, jaw set. "You  _ maybe _ have fifteen seconds before they shoot out the windows."

Lance stared hard at Keith, their glares matched and furious. Without a word, Lance shoved the chair back. Keith let out a startled grunt and he went over completely backward and landed flat, and Lance turned and grabbed Pidge by the elbow, pulling her down at the same time he dropped. "Hunk!" Lance bellowed. "Hit the deck!"

The last of his words were cut off by the explosion of shattering glass as an automatic weapon was fired through the front of the cabana.

 

* * *

Allura said, emphatically, " _ shit _ ."

She scrambled from her stomach onto her knees, the binoculars almost dropped in her haste. The echo of gunfire was loud even from this vantage point; enough so that the door to the dirty white van on the road behind her pulled open without her bidding. "What's going on-" Takashi Shirogane started to say, but Allura threw the binoculars at him and he caught them as they bounced against his chest.

"Out of the way," Allura said, and shoved Shiro back into the back of the van. The interior of the vehicle had been ripped away long ago, converted for use by surveillance teams and other ne'er-do-wells; on one of the monitors was the approximate GPS location of the tracker sewn into the bottom hem of Keith's shorts. "We've got to go,  _ now. _ "

"What's going on?" Shiro asked as he climbed over into the driver's seat. He had not had time to get changed or sleep since the early morning; his hair was starting to come out of its slicked-back style and the bow tie was mostly undone around his neck.

"They're already here," she said. "Sendak. All of them. They found Keith first."

" _ Shit _ ," Shiro said, and threw the van into drive without further question.

 

* * *

Keith lay on his back on the cabana's soft floor, and raged against how helpless he was. His arms tied tight behind him, his legs bound to the front legs of the chair and now, like a turtle, on his back and unable to do anything other then rock slightly back and forth.

The first round of gunfire had stopped. Keith couldn't see if anyone was hit, the silence that came after was almost deafening, as his ears rang in protest.

Six months. Six months they'd been playing catch-up, trying to track down Sendak's base of operations, trying to cut off another head of the hydra that was the entire GALRA organization, and now it was all blown to hell. Sendak must have known they were coming here, must have  _ seen _ Keith get his ass handed to him by two junior agents out on their first big boy mission, and followed them here in the determination to finish him off.

Hey, at least he was enough of a threat that they sent some serious firepower after him. There was  _ that _ , at least.

Through the silence he could hear the rustle of movement outside the cabana. Keith twisted again, trying his hardest to wrench his hands free, somehow -- when he felt someone grab the leg of the chair. Keith yanked his arms and tilted his head, to see Lance on his hands and knees, staring at Keith. "Your friends must not like you very much," Lance said, dust and debris from the destroyed windows and walls coating his skin and hair.

"They're not my friends," Keith said, his voice quite raw.

"Clearly," Lance said, and pulled out a small switchblade, cutting through the restraints that tied Keith's legs to the chair. "Hunk?" Lance called cautiously as he did so. "You still alive, babe? You hit?"

"Alive, I think," Hunk called from the bedroom. The wall facing the street was similarly shredded; although Hunk was already on his feet and slogging toward the window. He leaned one shoulder against the damaged wall and peered outside, to see half a dozen dark-haired men in identical suits, all holding automatic weapons with fresh cartridges. "For the moment."

"How many?" Pidge called out, sitting up on her knees, typing into the small holographic display her watch projected.

"Half dozen out front," Hunk responded. "Probably the same number headed around the rear, so twelve, thirteen, probably."

"And there's three of us, decent odds," Pidge said mostly to herself as she moved her finger in the air and rearranged things.

"Four of us," Lance said, as he cut the last of Keith's restraints.

"What? No, three," Pidge said, and lifted her head, somehow oblivious to what Lance had been doing up to that point. "Lance, what the  _ hell- _ "

Keith rolled off the chair and sat up, rubbing his wrists vigorously. "Truce?" Lance asked, extending his hand to Keith.

"For the moment," Keith said, but didn't accept Lance's hand.

"Great, four of us," Pidge muttered. "Go ahead and fudge our pickup plans Lance, it isn't like we haven't been planning for three this entire  _ time."  _ Pidge leaned to the side as a short burst of gunfire echoed from the room Hunk was in.

"I was wrong, there are fourteen," Hunk called, then another burst. "Twelve."

Lance leaned forward and brushed glass out of his hair. "We're presumably surrounded and our enemies have automatic weapons capable of blasting through walls. Any ideas, Keithy-boy?"

Keith shook his head, still attempting to rub feeling back into his wrists.

More gunfire from outside, but it didn't seem to be directed at the cabana itself. Keith tilted his head, then lunged forward, shoving both Lance and Pidge over again, and just in time too as the wall cracked and bowed in, the entire thing buckling as the front half of an ancient, windowless van slammed through the front wall.

Where the dust and detritus hadn't damaged the exterior of the van, there were pitted marks from all the bullets fired at it. "Shielded van?" Lance said as Keith rolled off of him.

The sliding door on the side was yanked open, and Lance's eyebrows went up as the woman from the previous night looked them all over. Her eyes alighted on Keith first, and she was clearly relieved to see him, but she looked over Lance and Pidge with a curious, thoughtful expression that she shook off quickly. "Did someone call for an escape route?"


	5. Chapter 5

There was barely enough room to fit three in the back of the surveillance van; never mind four people. Keith counted the pings off the rear of the vehicle as he pushed past Allura and climbed over into the passenger side seat of the van. "They've got to run out of ammunition sometime," he said. "Shouldn't the police be on their way by now, Sendak has turned a tourist resort into a war zone."

"You're overestimating the local police," Shiro said dryly, both hands on the steering wheel. The windshield had been cracked by the collision with the cabana's wall, a large chunk of stone still lay on the slope of the hood. Shiro looked over at Keith, and their eyes met for a moment and Keith could breathe again. "You all right?"

"Been better," Keith said, and opened the glove box. "Been a hell of a lot worse too." He popped two pills from an unlabeled orange bottle and swallowed dry, then turned his glare on Shiro in full. "You and the princess should have been gone  _ hours _ ago, what the  _ fuck _ are you still doing here?"

"Yeah, that's a  _ fantastic _ question," Lance yelled from right behind Keith's seat as he slammed the door to the van shut. "What are we still doing here, floor it!"

Shiro cocked his eyebrow at Keith, and threw the van into reverse.

 

* * *

It was fortunately a very short, if violent, ride. Hunk had braced his arm against the interior of the van, looping his hand in some restraint webbing that had been tacked around the display screens. Most lay dormant, monitors off, but a few were lit with various maps and at least one was covered in glyphs that were clearly a language; but one Hunk had definitely never seen before. He committed the symbols to memory while he was crammed in the back with Pidge's back crushed to his chest.

He looped his arm over her shoulders to keep her steady, and they both watched as Lance fell very convincingly into the unfamiliar woman several times. At least once unintentionally. "Unbelievable," Pidge muttered, and Hunk had to agree.

Finally the van rolled to an abrupt stop. Without exterior windows in the back Hunk didn't have any idea where they were or if it was safe to exit the van from the rear doors -- and he looked above Pidge's head to the woman beside Lance, only to see a small pistol in her hand now and Lance's hands out and palms up. "Exit from the side door please," she said pleasantly and after gesturing once with her gun, Lance opened the door obediently and allowed her first exit.

"That's  _ your _ gun, isn't it?" Pidge said dryly to Lance, who still kept his hands where they were clearly visible. "Why am I absolutely  _ not _ surprised?"

"Shut up,  _ Pidge _ ," Lance said through his teeth, climbing out of the van slowly.

Hunk was the last to disembark, behind Pidge. He moved slowly, like Lance and Pidge had, and kept his hands where they were clearly visible. He'd tucked his own weapon in the waistband of his trousers at the small of his back, the rest of their cache left abandoned at the cabana. Keith slid out of the passenger side door of the van and began patting Lance down, as he was the closest.

They were in what seemed to be an abandoned warehouse. The building was long and low and mostly empty; the door that the van must have driven through had half its windows boarded and the other half broken out. Hunk had a good idea where they were -- there was a port in the other direction where goods were shipped through, and plenty of warehouses that lay derelict and abandoned. If they'd lost their pursuit -- if their attackers had even put up any pursuit, that was -- the alleys and roads through the district were a rat's nest. They'd never be found.

"It's so nice to see that ghosts are alive and well," Pidge said with more vitriol in her voice than Hunk had ever heard, even directed at Lance. Hunk's gaze reoriented from assessing their surroundings to the situation at hand, in which Takashi Shirogane had come around the van and stood beside the light-haired woman, his arms folded and only providing them his profile as he spoke softly to her. "Where's my brother, you piece of  _ shit? _ "

There was a moment of silence, then Shirogane tilted his head and looked over at them finally. He stared directly at Pidge, brow furrowed in confusion, as if he couldn't quite parse what she had said. Pidge stepped forward, or at least attempted to before Keith caught her arm and stopped her in her tracks. "My  _ brother _ , you know, the agent you got  _ killed _ , Shiro!"

"I don't really think it matters, Pidge," Lance said. "They're just gonna put a bullet in our skulls and dump us in the sea."

"It matters to  _ me _ ," Pidge hissed.

"If we wanted you dead, we'd have left you for Sendak and his goons," Keith said as he relieved Hunk of his weapon. Hunk kept his hands in the same spot so he wouldn't draw attention to them. "Though we can change our mind."

"I'm sorry, I don't  _ know _ you," Shiro said. "I don't--"

"It's Holt's sister," Keith said as he walked back around them. "I know it's been a long night, Shiro, but you can't be  _ that _ oblivious." He emptied Hunk's gun of its cartridge and cleared the chamber before dropping it on one of the sparse, empty tables that were scattered about behind them. Keith then sauntered around to Shiro and stepped in too close to his personal space. Without even looking at him, Shiro wound his arm around Keith and, after a moment, turned his head and leaned in to kiss him.

"Holt's sister," Shiro said a little blankly when Keith moved away from him. He was clearly processing this, and it was obvious when everything fell into place and he jerked, and turned toward Pidge. "Holt's  _ sister _ ," he said in recognition. " _ Katie. _ "

"Don't you dare call me that," Pidge said. "Don't you even  _ dare. _ " This time it was Hunk who caught her shoulder, but her movement forward seemed more perfunctory. Her shoulders were shaking too hard. "I should  _ kill _ you-"

"Mission parameters," Lance said mildly. "Although I'd help."

"Guys," Hunk said, then looked to the woman with the gun. She'd been silent through most of this, watching the interaction with a peculiar expression on her face. She wore loose trousers and a blouse, and had hair so blonde it almost looked white in the pale light. "If you're not going to kill us, why did you help us?" Hunk said. "You can't be unaware of what we're here for."

"We've been watching you since the border," Shiro said. Keith untucked himself from Shiro's side and walked back around to the van. Lance turned a little so that he could see both Shiro and the woman, and keep an eye on what Keith was doing.

"Since before that," Keith said, and the woman nodded. "Since we turned up on the Garrison's radar we've been watching to see who they'd send after us." He snorted a little. "Rookies. Figures."

" _ Hey _ ," Lance said. "Who the fuck are you calling a  _ rookie? _ " His attention had drifted fully to Keith. "I have more missions closed in my file than you  _ ever _ will, traitor."

"Allura, why  _ did _ we bring them here?" Keith called as he hopped up into the van, ignoring the way Lance was glaring at him. "They  _ are _ Garrison. We let them loose and they run home with their tails between their legs."

The woman named Allura sighed and propped one hand on her hip. She pointed the muzzle of Lance's pistol at the ceiling. "Because, Keith, we can't  _ do _ this with just the three of us. We need more help than that."

"Help with  _ what? _ " Hunk asked, at the same time that Pidge said "I'd rather be die than help you."

Lance pointed at Keith. "You and me, buddy. Let's go."

Shiro looked pointedly at Allura, who laid the gun on the table behind her, beside Hunk's. "I sure hope you know what you're doing," he said softly.

"Don't worry," Allura said. "I do."

  
  
  



	6. Chapter 6

"I'm afraid we don't have a lot of time for details," the woman called Allura said. They had moved away from the van and were arrayed around what was clearly a thrown-together briefing area. There was an old battered couch with questionable, stained fabric and several chairs that had seen better days. Hunk seated himself on the couch without issue, and Lance only hesitated a moment before following suit. Pidge remained standing, as did Shiro, who followed Allura as she walked around the scattered seats toward a board covered in papers and string. Keith perched on the armrest of one of the chairs, his attention divided between Allura and watching the three of them. "Our schedule has been accelerated greatly by Sendak's arrival."

"Yeah, you mentioned that name before," Lance said. "And, by the way, we didn't agree to help you yet. We're just hearing out the details."

"So you can run back and report it all to the Garrison," Keith snorted. "You realize that they're crooked, right? That's why they tried to have Shiro ki-"

_"Keith,_ " Shiro said sharply, cutting the other man off.

The silence was hard-edged for a moment, before Hunk cleared his throat. "What, exactly is going on?"

Allura touched her hand to the board behind her. "My name is Allura, last princess of Altea," she said. "Those who attacked you, they're part of a larger organization responsible for the destruction of my homeland." She looked to Shiro, who had taken a position near her, arms folded, not unlike that of a bodyguard. Lance shifted forward a little in his seat. "Both Shiro, and ..." she looked over to where Keith sat perched, his attention on her, "Keith, they've pledged to help me stop that organization before they can do the same to countless others."

"Yeah, that sounds noble and all," Lance said, "but we don't do politics or charity cases." He started to lean forward, as if he was going to get up, when Hunk caught his elbow and yanked him back down into his seat.

"Don't try to act like the Garrison isn't funded by one of the most corrupt nations on the planet," Keith said to Lance. He looked back to Allura. "We can't trust them at _all_ , Allura, I don't know why you think that this is a good idea."

"Yeah, if you look at it, _we're_ not the ones with questionable loyalties, pal," Lance was once again kept in his seat by the fact that Hunk still had a solid grip on his arm. "Hunk, man, if you don't let me go..."

"He's right," Pidge said quietly, from behind them. Both Hunk and Lance turned their heads a bit, and Pidge was standing with her arms folded and her gaze trained on the floor. "The Garrison is corrupt. It goes all the way to the top." She pushed her glasses up her nose and looked at Lance, who was staring at her. "I've been pulling at threads for a long time," she said. "Why do you think I joined up? I wanted to find out what happened to my brother." Her gaze flickered to Shiro, who held his expression impassive. "At least now I'm starting to get somewhere."

Lance looked from Pidge, to Hunk. Hunk wasn't looking at Lance any longer, he had directed his gaze back toward Allura, and the board behind her. "This organization that you're opposing," he said. "GALRA, right?" At Allura's affirmative nod, he slumped back into the couch and sighed deeply, releasing Lance's arm. "I've heard of them before," he said as Lance rubbed his elbow angrily. "They're bad news."

"Has everyone lost their _minds_?" Lance said. "Our mission is that guy-" he jabbed his finger in Shiro's direction. "And we'd get bonuses for bringing in Kogane over there. You aren't seriously thinking about this?"

"You're the one who was yelling _'truce, truce'_ in the middle of a gunfight," Pidge said.

"Situational hazard," Lance retorted. "I've never even _heard_ of Altea, this sounds like a setup to me." He stood up and put both his hands out. "What's the deal if I say I'm out, you shoot me and dump me in the river...?"

"Lance," Hunk said firmly. "Sit down."

"Nobody is getting shot," Allura said in that same, firm tone. "If you wish to leave, no one will keep you here." Keith was already halfway to his feet, and he hesitated at Allura's words and then sank slowly back down to his seat on the edge of the armrest. "We're not interested in making enemies today, we have enough of those already."

"Come on, Pidge," Lance said. He was staring at Hunk, who was still seated on the couch. Hunk folded his arms and met Lance's eye, clearly not moving a muscle. After a moment of this stare-off, Lance realized that Pidge had not responded and he turned his attention to her.

She stood behind the couch, arms still folded and a conflicted expression on her face. "I don't want to help them," she said finally. "But I want to find out what happened to my brother, and _he's_ the only lead I have." She spat the end of the sentence like it tasted dirty. "It's the whole reason I joined up, Lance. I can't walk away from that."

"Oh, come _on_ ," Lance said, and looked back at Hunk.

"He's not wrong about the Garrison," Hunk said. "You know that as well as I do that there is some seriously shady shit going on, Lance." He tilted his head when Lance made a noise of disgust. "Remember Laos?"

This time Lance scoffed and looked away. "I can't believe any of you," he said finally, but he didn't move, instead looking to Allura who was watching their conversation silently. "Why us?" he said.

Allura said, in that same level, firm tone; "Lance McClain, eighty-three confirmed kills at over 1,000 yards."

Lance blanched. "My file is sealed," he said hoarsely. "How did you get that information?"

"Hunk Garrett," Allura continued. "Master strategist and expert in demolitions." Hunk shrugged loosely from the couch. "And Katherine "Pidge" Holt, deep intel and technology." Allura folded her arms and raised her eyebrow at Lance.

"Damn, Lance," Pidge actually sounded slightly impressed. "That's more than I thought."

"Shut up, Pidge," Lance said, his voice strange.

"To answer your question," Allura said finally, "you all possess unique talents that I require. That's ' _why you.'_ "

 

* * *

 

Lance stood on the roof of the warehouse. The sun was well past its zenith now, headed toward the far horizon. The water was alive with activity, boats large and small, cars and freight moving about the docks as business went on like usual. After a good wait of ten minutes that Hunk did not come after him he fished a nearly-crushed plastic packaging out of his back pocket and pulled out a slightly-bent cigarette, hand cupped over the end to facilitate lighting it. The wind that rolled off the water was steady up here, heavy with the tang of ocean.

They'd been talking for hours now. Well, Allura had done most of the talking. She talked about what they had accomplished so far, what they planned to do, the structure of this GALRA organization that somehow Lance had _never_ heard of (and yet Hunk had?), and the lieutenant in town that Allura and Shiro and Keith had come to eliminate.

Nothing about this felt right to him. He'd had a crawling sensation up and down his spine the entire briefing. Shiro had disappeared for a brief while, he'd returned with food and beer and they'd eaten (albeit in Lance's case, reluctantly). He didn't trust this, he didn't know _what_ was going on, but this was something else entirely. Despite his misgivings though, this GALRA group seemed like trouble, and he did agree it needed to be dealt with.

He exhaled a long line of smoke into the sea breeze. They'd been given their weapons back, what few they'd had on them. Lance mourned briefly for the rifle that had been left behind; he'd used it a long while and it felt more like an extension of his own body. There would be other rifles and he would learn their quirks in time, but he would sorely miss his tool.

"So you _can_ be quiet," Allura's voice came from behind him. Lance didn't take the cigarette out of his mouth, but he did turn slightly to look at her.

In the sunlight, her hair _was_ white. Not so-blonde-it-was-white, but a colorless white that took on the quality of the sky now, blue seeming to creep into its strands. Lance frowned a little; there was something about it that seemed unsettling to him but he couldn't put his finger on it. "What do you want?"

"We plan to leave at dusk," she said.

"Your pal Sendak's in town," he said, and flicked the ash off the end of his cigarette. "Why are you leaving?"

" _We're_ leaving," Allura said.

Lance ignored the way she emphasized the words. "If Sendak's the problem, why run? He's in town, you're in town, seems like basic math to me."

"You overestimate our capabilities," Allura said softly. She moved to stand beside Lance, her arms folded as she looked out over the small bit of view provided by the rooftop. "We were but three this morning. Even now it would be nothing for Sendak to crush us." The sea breeze caught the loose ends of her hair and stirred them around.

"Okay, _princess_ ," Lance said, not bothering to mask the derogatory way he said the title. "Tell me the truth."

Allura tilted her head, a scowl settling on her features. "I have spoken nothing but."

"Yeah, okay," Lance said. "This whole thing you're trying to do ... it's just revenge, isn't it? For your kingdom, or whatever it was." He inhaled deeply, and muttered the last bit mostly to himself. "Didn't really think there were _kingdoms_ anymore, anyway.."

Allura simply looked at Lance and said nothing.

He shrugged loosely. "Not that there's anything wrong with revenge. Vengeance is clean and forward, not any of this 'saving the world' bullshit layered over top. If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck..."

"Vengeance isn't the only thing that moves some of us forward." Allura looked at the sky for a moment, then back over to Lance, whose own face had turned to stone. "That wasn't in your file, though I think it's plainly obvious given its contents. "When Keith and Pidge return, we'll be leaving. It's too early to confront Sendak, he's waiting for us."

"And where are _we_ going?" Lance said, the taste of tobacco bitter in his mouth.

Allura smiled at him, and the expression soured his stomach further. Lance dropped his cigarette and ground it out under the heel of his shoe. By the time he looked up she was gone, back inside and down the concrete stairs. He could hear the sea birds calling and for a moment more Lance lingered, looking out at the water framed by coast, and the way it stretched toward the horizon.

Every time he looked out at the ocean, he wondered if it would be the last time. One of these times, it would be.

 

 


	7. Chapter 7

Keith was not aware that he was tapping his foot until Shiro leaned in, resting his hand on Keith's shoulder. "Breathe," Shiro murmured directly into his ear, and Keith shivered and glanced over at Shiro. He wasn't unaware of the effect that had on Keith, and Shiro gave him a small, tight smile. The train station was busy around them, and they could easily be observed and overheard by those who wished them ill, so Keith had to choose his words carefully.

"I don't like the way that we split up," he said finally. "I don't trust them not to bolt. We should have each gone with one."

"Trust Allura's instincts," Shiro said softly. "She knows what she's doing."

_She's the only one,_ Keith thought but didn't say aloud.

They'd split into three groups of two – while in tourist country groups of six were not uncommon, groups of two flew almost completely under the radar. They would all be on the same overnight train, at least. Keith wouldn't speak his worry aloud, but he didn't like leaving Allura alone with any one of those Garrison brats. His foot started tapping again, arms folded, and he heard Shiro chuckle lightly. "What are _you_ in such a good mood about?" Keith snapped, and Shiro snaked his left arm over Keith's shoulders and pulled him close.

"We're supposed to be on vacation together," he said in that same soft tone, his face turned in toward Keith's to avoid lip-readers reading surveillance cameras. "Why don't you act like it, hm?"

Keith narrowed his eyes at Shiro and Shiro laughed again, touched Keith's jaw with two fingers from his right hand. "Honeymooners?" Shiro suggested, and Keith couldn't keep the scowl going. He sighed and acquiesced, allowing Shiro to tilt his face so they could exchange a brief kiss.

"You're lucky I like you," he said lightly when Shiro's lips left his.

"Mm, _lucky_ me," Shiro said, and didn't lift his arm from across Keith's shoulders.

They were dressed as vacationing tourists to help deflect additional attention, although Shiro was wearing a long-sleeved button-up and trousers and in this heat that would draw attention in and of itself. He hadn't dyed his hair back to black, either, and the white streak was clearly identifiable. Keith had given up on bothering him about it, and Allura didn't seem to notice or care how memorable it made Shiro. At least, for the most part, he had taken to wearing hats. "You're a lousy spy," Keith said, and Shiro's grin didn't flicker a bit. "Public displays are a nuisance."

"Public displays make people uncomfortable," Shiro said dutifully. "They're going to avoid looking more than actually look. It's almost a better disguise." He rocked back and forth a little on his heels, his arm heavy and comfortable. "They won't bolt."

Keith sighed. "I don't trust them." He touched his fingers to his lips, to the casual observer it would be in reference to the kiss they had just shared. "The big one knocked me the fuck out. They were gonna torture me, Takashi."

"Would you have done any differently?" Shiro asked quietly.

" _Yes._ "

"In your Garrison days?"

Keith opened his mouth, then shut it quickly and looked away from Shiro, aiming his glare down the platform. The train wasn't available for boarding yet, and the crowds were accumulating rapidly. "We shouldn't talk about this here," he said finally. "Not in the open."

Shiro inclined his head, acknowledging Keith's concern. He didn't remove his hand from Keith's shoulders, though, and they stood in silence and watched the crowd.

 

* * *

 

If Hunk had not been witness to Pidge's transformations prior to this mission, he would not have recognized the woman that stepped delicately out of the taxi. She was slim and tanned, with beach-blonde hair pulled back into a tight, high ponytail and fashionable sunglasses sitting atop her head. A thin, spaghetti-strapped tank that barely covered her stomach and very, very short shorts paired with high-heeled strappy sandals and a small bag on her shoulder made her stand out, but only to him. Hunk had a heavy duffel bag slung over his shoulder containing every bit of tech that Pidge would require, as well as a regular change of clothes for when she would undoubtedly need it.

She stood on the sidewalk of the train station for a moment, scanning around before her gaze settled on Hunk. It had been Lance's idea to arrive separately, to stagger their arrivals to the station just in case everyone's cover had been blown and not just Allura's team; and Hunk had to agree it was a good idea. However, he had clear forgotten that Pidge would actually show up wearing something appropriate for the area and not just wearing her favorite oversized shirt and shorts.

"Don't say it," Pidge said, dropping the sunglasses onto her nose and at least presenting a slightly familiar profile. "I don't want to hear it."

"I'm not Lance," Hunk said mildly, but didn't say anything else, shifting the duffel bag to his other shoulder and holding the door to the station open. Pidge did not trip on her spiked heels once.

They passed Keith and Shiro inside; they were standing together in line at a coffee kiosk. Hunk noted with some amusement Shiro's double-take. "I hate this," Pidge said, her tone light and the complete opposite of her words. "I wish I'd packed a suit instead."

"A suit would attract the opposite amount of attention," Hunk said. It was true, most of the people in the train's terminal were dressed casually. There was a small subset that were clad in business attire; most were attending clearly wealthy patrons. "You could have gone as Allura's bodyguard instead of Lance," Hunk said thoughtfully.

"Don't remind me," Pidge said with a distracted sigh. She shifted the small purse she wore on her shoulder and drew her eyebrows together, looking down at it like she couldn't quite remember its purpose. "I was sincerely hoping for some alone time with at least one of our new friends to see what I could find out." She tilted her head and the long ponytail brushed between her shoulder blades, wagging a bit like a tail, before she glanced over her shoulder and above the frames of her sunglasses. "Not that your company is unwelcome, Hunk."

"At least you didn't get stuck with Lance," Hunk said.

"I would have fed him his own ballsack before the train left the station," Pidge said in that same pleasant, upbeat, cheery tone. Hunk snorted in amusement and nodded his head, moving forward to hold open the next set of doors that led to the train's platform.

 

* * *

 

"We're being watched," Lance said. He was looking down the length of the train, from where they were positioned near the front. When he asked about earpieces to relay information between the three teams Keith had looked to Shiro with an eyebrow raised and made Shiro explain with a large sigh that they didn't use earpieces. "Well, that's stupid," Lance had said, and that was that. With nearly all of their Garrison gear left behind, that meant they would have to make do with whatever crap that Allura's group had scrounged together in the abandoned warehouse. Which, as it turned out, was not much.

"I am well aware of that fact, thank you," Allura said. She was standing beside Lance, dressed in high quality clothes clearly made for travel. She had maintained with trousers and a blouse, but had covered her hair a bit with a gauzy, thin scarf and complimented the ensemble with sunglasses. It made her look a bit like a starlet on the move, and that was bringing with it the sort of attention that Lance wasn't comfortable with. Granted, people weren't looking at _him_ , but Allura being noticeable and noticed still set his teeth on edge. She fiddled with a bracelet she wore, silver with some teal inlay, and frowned. "The train should be boarding any moment now, the delay unsettling."

"Yeah," Lance said. "Unsettling." He kept his hands out of his pockets and at his side. Allura had taken him shopping before they left, put him in a tailored suit and loafers and dark sunglasses. _Bodyguard._ He'd been waved around the metal detectors without having to unholster, and that was a first. He'd looked to Allura, but she was carrying on with a bored and disinterested expression he'd seen many times before on the faces of the elite. _When you're rich the same rules don't apply to you._ "I still don't see why if you can whip out that card and buy fancy threads you can't shell out a few dollars to properly equip the people you've hired – which, by the way, we've not discussed salary yet."

"We will." Allura turned slightly away, and Lance's eyes drifted down the curve of her figure before he spotted the cluster of men in suits farther down the platform. She moved a little, and Lance followed the motion, smoothly switching places with her, effortlessly shielding her from their gaze. "GALRA?" he murmured, and she inclined her head but did not nod.

"If not, trouble either way," she said.

"I expect to be fairly compensated," Lance said, picking up the thread of his conversation up as naturally as if there had been no interruption. "If I'm whoring myself out as a mercenary you better be breaking out the big bucks, lady." He didn't take his eyes from the men despite not quite facing them, thankful for the open-air platform making sunglasses not suspect but the norm. Four of them, big men, thick with muscle barely constrained by ill-tailored suits. They were too far away to check for weapons, but anyone looking like that much trouble was definitely carrying.

"All the riches you desire," Allura murmured, a tight smile on her face. "We'll discuss compensation at a later time."

She fiddled with the bracelet again, the only outward appearance of anxiety she was displaying. Lance leaned back just a little, hands still held loose at his sides. They had started boarding the train now, tickets being held out or phones being scanned. He touched Allura's elbow, getting her attention that way and letting her lead them both forward, to the line forming for entrance to the first train carriage. The unusual boarding procedure kept Lance on edge enough that he didn't notice the direction that the four large men in their ill-fighting suits had slipped off, and by the time he'd realized they'd gone he and Allura were almost aboard the train. He didn't say anything to Allura, and held out both their tickets to the man scanning them, following her aboard the carriage.

They were still being watched.

Into the train proper, and settled – Lance held the door to the small compartment open, allowed Allura in first and then as he secured the door behind them she cleared the space. Her ticket had bought them a private compartment; split in half it had a bench seat across one side and a plush bed across from it. Lance's eyebrow lifted automatically at the accommodations as Allura held the door open to the shared space between the private compartments, where a small lavatory and sink split the room.

"All clear," Allura said, and locked the door to the lavatory.

"Is the entire train private compartments?" Lance asked, and Allura nodded her head.

"Semi-private, the smaller ones don't have proper beds or shared bathrooms," she said. "We've got a long journey ahead of us."

"Should have just flown," Lance seated himself on the bench beside the window. "Much faster. How long does it take for this thing to go through the mountains?"

"Fourteen hours until the last stop," Allura pulled the scarf from her hair and ran her fingers through it; working some of the knots loose, before tossing the scarf at Lance and grinning lazily. "We'll be getting off _well_ before that."

Lance's eyebrow went up again.

 

 


	8. Chapter 8

Away from the coast the sky darkened gradually, thin clouds turning thick and heavy with rain. Keith sat on the padded bench seat, one elbow braced against the sill of the window as he watched the verdant countryside scroll past at speed. Shiro sat opposite him on the other bench seat, legs crossed and a tablet propped up in his lap. It was a consumer grade device, laden down with bloatware and easily hackable. They weren't using it for anything so nefarious, Shiro was actually playing some random preloaded game that had annoying sound effects.

Rain pattered softly against the window as the train headed steadily toward the distant mountains. Keith sighed heavily and shifted, and Shiro didn't look up. "Don't leave the compartment," he said, tapping the surface of the tablet and concentrating on the game. Keith had been about to rise up off his seat, and at Shiro's words dropped his center of gravity back against the cushion. He folded his arms over his chest and slumped a little, then put his leg out as far is it would go, resting it on the cushion outside of Shiro's thigh.

"We should have upgraded," Keith said. "Gotten a bed."

"The benches can be converted into bunks," Shiro said, still without looking up. Keith let out an exasperated noise and nudged Shiro's thigh with the top of his shoe. This action did in fact call Shiro's attention to his foot, which traveled up his leg and finally to Keith's face, eyebrow cocked in solid amusement. "What?"

"I want to check on Allura," Keith said. "I don't trust him around her. I still don't even know if I trust _her_." He let out a long, aggravated noise and Shiro put aside the tablet, scratching his jaw with his left hand as he glanced out the window at the dark, rainy scenery.

"There's no point to wandering around the train just yet," Shiro said. It was a matter-of-fact statement but it still made Keith bristle just a little bit. "All it would do is attract suspicion. We already know some of Sendak's men are on board."

Keith recalled the pair of broad-shouldered goons that had shoved past them while boarding. They were fairly generic in description, with easily forgettable faces and hair; but they stank like they hadn't bathed in weeks. They were also both very tall, taller than Shiro even. "Remind me why we aren't doing anything about that again," Keith muttered, arms still folded sullenly.

"You've been acting like a petulant teenager since we left out this morning," Shiro said. "Stop it."

Keith met Shiro's eye, jaw tilted up aggressively. "We're surrounding ourselves with unknown variables; our cover's been blown and Sendak is on to us and now we're on the _run_. We were about to bring the fight to them when everything went to hell and the princess _invited_ the perpetrators into the fold. Sorry if me being a little on edge about what's probably going to lead to a very ugly death is considered _petulant._ " He exhaled heavily and looked away finally, back out the window.

"They were chosen for this a long time ago," Shiro said. "You know that."

"I don't have to like it," Keith said. "We could have still gotten it done without them. One of them even wants _you_ dead, I don't know why you're so blase about that."

Shiro was silent for a long moment, looking at Keith, watching him. "What is this really about, Keith?" Keith did not respond, straightening himself and dropping his foot off the bench beside Shiro. Shiro leaned forward, elbows on his knees and hands dangling, eyebrow cocked. "Is it that you're jealous?"

"What!? _No_ ," Keith's face flushed in indignation. Anyone else he would have been able to control that response, but the way that Shiro was looking at him, a small half-grin on his face, head cocked and looking up through thick lashes and Keith couldn't look him in the eye. "I'm not jealous, what the _fuck_." Shiro had this way of worming in under his skin in a way that no one previous had been able. It was an effective technique, an almost effortless seduction that he'd seen turned on many others before and yet always seemed to fall prey to himself.

"I think you are." Shiro sat up a little, elbows still on his knees. "The princess has turned her attention on a new toy and you're jealous."

Keith scoffed, felt the heat of his cheeks betraying him. "We should focus on the mission," he said. "My feelings are irrelevant."

"Will you be able to rely on our new teammates?" Shiro asked.

"Will _you_?" Keith snorted. "At least none of them want me _dead_."

"Katie doesn't want me dead," Shiro said, and there was an undercurrent that Keith recognized in his voice. "She wants her family back. You should be able to relate to that, at least."

"Fuck you," Keith snapped, back going straight against the firm upper cushion of the bench. "You don't get to bring that up, _fuck_ you, Shiro."

Shiro sat up as well, tilting his head slightly in apology but not voicing the words. "We have to work together," he said simply. " _All_ of us. You know what's at stake as well as I do." He stood then, and Keith pushed himself back against the seat but Shiro went to the edge of the compartment, where the pair of duffel bags were sitting atop a riser above the door. "We need to be prepared for when Sendak's men make trouble."

"Not 'if'?" Keith snorted, as Shiro dropped his duffel on the bench beside Keith. There was a knock on the outside of their compartment, and Keith's arms unfolded fast as he exchanged a look with Shiro. They didn't have much by way of weapons with them, just what they were able to carry thanks to the corrupt security officer who had accepted a cash bribe. Shiro waited until Keith had fished a small pistol from out of the duffel bag before he flipped the lock on the compartment and opened the door.

There was a man outside with two clothing bags on hangers. Shiro accepted the hangers after a brief exchange in the staffer's native language; although Keith did not put the concealed weapon away until Shiro had closed and locked the door again, hooking the hangers on the lip of the riser. "Looks like we're dressing up for dinner," Shiro said, noting the tag on the clothing bag. "Courtesy of the princess."

"I knew she'd use those measurements for evil," Keith said, and Shiro chuckled a little as he seated himself again opposite Keith. He propped his elbow against the window and rested his cheek against his hand lightly, looking at Keith with that same fond expression that Keith found both unsettling and slightly arousing. Keith raised an eyebrow at that look, then tilted his head back, exposing the vulnerable line of his throat above the collar of his shirt. Shiro's eyes traveled downward, and Keith lazily kicked his legs out again. "You _can't_ possibly be hungry already," he said, as Shiro lifted his head from his hand.

"I'm simply ravenous," Shiro murmured as he crossed the small compartment to Keith.

 

* * *

 

 

Allura's skin was warmer than Lance had anticipated; or maybe it had just been that long since he'd had a moment to stop and just touch. He rested the palm of his hand on the soft, rounded curve of her belly and felt her body jump slightly at the touch. Her skin was much darker in tone than his own, and he admired the contrast as he spread his fingers. Allura let out a small sigh and arched her back against the bed, bringing her body up against his hand, her arms thrown loosely above her head. "Mm, _what_ are you doing?" she asked lazily, eyes still closed. "You haven't forgotten, have you?"

"Hardly," Lance said, putting both of his hands in the sheets along her chest and pushing forward again. She reacted to that with a low noise, her hips lifting off the bed as he moved them both. She extended her leg out and then hooked it over his back, her chest heaving as he got deep with the motion. Allura was receptive and warm and _tight_ , and Lance was amazed he'd held off for this long as it was. She smiled lazily up at him and damn if she didn't get _tighter_. He groaned a little as she reached out and touched his cheek.

"Come on then," she scolded lightly. "Do me like you _mean_ it, I won't break." She bit her bottom lip as her hands slid down to rest flat on the broad planes of his chest. He caught one of her hands and dragged it up to his mouth, kissing her palm delicately and Allura's laugh was almost as intoxicating as her scent. There was something about it that was making his head spin, making him dizzy in a way that sex rarely did. If he'd been in better control of his facilities maybe he would have stopped it there, but he was buried in her deep and all system commands had been overridden.

She pushed him off her with surprising ease, and Lance grunted, a little disappointed until she rolled him firmly onto his back and she straddled him. "See, now," she said. "If you're not going to be cooperative I'll just have to fuck _you_ ," and while she was scolding him she was parting her folds with her fingers and nestling the head of his cock against her.

"That barely seems like a punishment to me," Lance said as she settled down atop him. It didn't much feel like one either, as she let out a satisfied noise and stretched her body out, her arms over her head and her breasts jutting at a perky angle away from her body. He settled one hand on her hip and ran the other up her side, palming a breast with one hand and rolling it. She looked down at him, her strange, unnaturally colored hair reflecting the blue of the bedspread and he swore for a moment that her eyes glimmered a different shade. A trick of the light, just like the bracelet she still wore glowing a soft teal instead of reflecting the overhead light, and Lance didn't think much more about it as she leaned forward over him and brought her hips down hard, riding him into the mattress that rocked softly with the train's momentum.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

"Don't you dare look up my shorts," Pidge said as she balanced on one foot on the plush red bench of the passenger compartment. "I'll kick you in the face with this fucking spike heel, I dare you to try." She wasn't even looking at Hunk, who was steadying her with one hand as she groped through the small entry she'd made in the overhead compartment's paneling. "I will fucking blind you."

Hunk managed to keep the smirk out of his voice but his face respectfully averted. "I think you're forgetting who you're talking to," he said, and then _had_ to look because she had pushed forward closer to him and put her _knee_ on his shoulder and that put his face in exactly the last place he wanted his face to be at the moment. "Pidge!"

"Hang on, hang on-" she said, and Hunk tried not to think about the fact that her crotch was directly in his face. "I've almost ... _fuck-_ " she extended herself just a little farther and Hunk was about to suggest he turn around so she could just climb on his shoulders when she let out a triumphant yelp. "Got it!"

The cable bundle that she threaded out through the hole didn't have a lot of slack to give. Pidge jammed the closed sunglasses through the bundle of cords so it wouldn't snap back through the hole, keeping it out and visible. Then she put one hand on Hunk's head and pushed off him, balancing back on the bench seat. "Sorry about that, Hunk," she said. "Your face is really red."

"Yeah, that happens when my face gets all up in someone's business," Hunk said. He craned his neck and looked up at the corded bundle of wires. "Which one do you need to splice into, just the ethernet?"

"The cat-6," Pidge said, pulling a rolled up kit from her bag and selecting a crimping tool. "The onboard wifi is crap here and if we want to stay off the Garrison's radar I can't tap into the global network, so we gotta do things the old-fashioned way." She pulled a few more tools out and a roll of electrical tape. "I'll need to sit on your shoulders for this, hope you don't mind."

"As long as there are no more threats at blinding me, that's fine," Hunk said. He dropped into a crouch that allowed Pidge to hop on his shoulders with ease, and took some of the tools from her as he slowly got to his feet. "What do you think about all this, anyway? Think this Allura chick is legit?"

"I've never heard of Altea," Pidge said as she selected the ethernet cable and cut into its casing. "But she's got two dead men working for her, and one that will lead me to my brother, so I can hang tight for the moment."

"There was something on in that van," Hunk said. "Weird writing, I'd never seen it before."

"Mm," Pidge had the crimping tool in her mouth as she worked. "What'd it look like?"

"I don't know, it doesn't resemble anything I've ever seen," he said. "I didn't know what to make of it, I'll see if I can recreate it for you." He handed up the electrical tape at her bidding, and they both jumped when they heard the heavy knock at the door to the compartment.

"Shit!" Pidge hissed, and jumped off of Hunk's shoulder. Hunk moved quickly to the door because he wasn't certain he'd locked it, and when he opened it there was a staff member standing there with two clothing bags.

"What was that about?" Pidge asked when Hunk closed the door, holding the two bags curiously. She had already attached an ethernet cord, pulling it down far enough to hook it into her secure laptop.

"Apparently we have a dinner date," Hunk said, unzipping one of the bags to show of a sleek, tailored suit. "I don't see what the point was of splitting us up if we're going to all meet up in the dining car, that's..." he trailed off, a little uneasy at the thought. "Do you think she wanted to get Lance alone?"

"Probably." Pidge looked up. "Is that a dress? Did that bitch send me a fucking _cocktail_ dress? Goddammit," she sighed, balancing the laptop on her crossed legs. "I _knew_ I should have brought a suit."

 

* * *

 

The thing about Keith, Shiro knew, what that the key to getting him out of whatever funk was bothering him was to distract him. He was hard as shit to distract, though, as Keith could possess a single-minded intensity that helped drive him to get to the end of whatever a mission entailed. It was a fantastic quality to have in their particular line of work, at least until Keith turned that single-minded intensity on something other than the mission itself.

Fortunately, the key to distraction could be pretty straightforward, all things considered.

"Nngh, _Shiro_ ," Keith said, his fingers tight in Shiro's hair. He'd intended to have his hair trimmed, it had grown unevenly, leaving a rather large forelock of hair gone white that was very easily recognizable ... but it was also nice to have something for Keith to curl his fingers into and hang on with. It had its uses, even if he'd dye it and get it trimmed when he next had the chance.

Keith was sprawled on the seat now, his legs thrown wide, one hooked over Shiro's shoulder. His shorts hung off one leg, he'd not kicked them free yet. Shiro smirked a little at the way Keith said his name, and licked slowly up the underside of Keith's cock. "You haven't called me that in a while," he said, and he meant it in a teasing manner because he didn't mind the nickname at all, but Keith took it to heart immediately and moaned his given name instead.

His cock was short and thick, and Shiro could easily suck the head into his mouth, taking Keith in almost all the way. His musk was thickest here, when Shiro had his nose buried in the wiry black hair that frame Keith's cock, and it was a scent that made his mouth water even if it wasn't already occupied. "Takashi," Keith grunted again, and Shiro lifted his head slowly, letting Keith slide free with a slick, filthy sound. He knew Keith's eyes were locked on him and he made a show of slowly cleaning the tip of his cock again, pulling his foreskin back all the way to show its glistening, fat head.

"Enjoying yourself?" Shiro asked lazily, his eyes drifting up to Keith's violet ones, his pupils dilated large. Shiro rested his right hand on Keith's thigh and utilized his left, mostly, squeezing round the base. He was so hard it was an effort to keep himself from pressing his own hand against himself, he would have time to take care of that after Keith was spent.

"Your mouth is so good," Keith said, and that hand that had been tight in his hair slid down his face, fingers brushing over the rise of his cheek and lingering on the half-faded scar across his nose. He didn't say anything then, but his brow furrowed and Shiro could sense the direction of his thoughts, so he took it upon himself to redirect them; primarily by liberal application of his tongue to various lower bits of Keith's anatomy. The startled his as he went further south was enough to tell him that his plan had mostly succeeded, as he sucked part of Keith's sack into his mouth and this time, Keith moaned, both of his hands going to Shiro's head now, his hips bucking.

"You wanna finish in my mouth or on my face?" Shiro asked, his voice gone low.

"Mouth," was the only thing Keith could get out, the rest of his words broken into guttural syllables. Shiro obeyed, resuming his attention on Keith's cock itself, his left hand slipping down to cradle his sack so that he could feel when he started to twitch and tighten, the only warning he'd get as Keith's fingers tightening on his scalp always happened the split-second _after_ he started to ejaculate.

Keith jammed his hips forward and Shiro didn't gag himself as Keith came directly down his throat. He only choked on the withdraw, when the thick white fluid filled his throat before he could swallow again. Shiro coughed a little as he drew back, breaking the sticky strand of saliva that still connected him to Keith's cock. Keith wasn't watching, his eyes closed and mouth open as he panted raggedly, and there were still a few dribbles escaping from his jerking cock. Shiro stroked him a few more times, even as Keith hissed at the pressure on his sensitive flesh, and when he opened his eyes to meet Shiro's he didn't flinch away from his fluids still on Shiro's mouth and chin when Shiro rose up and kissed him.

"Better?" Shiro asked, tugging on Keith's lower lip with his teeth.

"So far," Keith said, breathless. He caught Shiro's shirt with one hand and looked at him with drowsy, yet still intense, eyes. "What about you?" he asked.

"What about me?" Shiro asked, rubbing his thumb over the head of Keith's cock. "You wanna return the favor?"

"Mm," Keith said. "Maybe I wanna return it with interest." He ran his tongue over his lips slowly, pink against the bruised red, and then leaned forward and licked at Shiro's chin, cleaning some of his own fluids there. "Maybe I wanna ride you."

"Maybe later," Shiro said, brushing his hand back into Keith's hair. "I don't think we have enough time before dinner."

"Screw dinner," Keith said. Shiro laughed a little and stood, unbuckling his trousers to reveal the bulge in his boxers. Keith caught his hip and tugged him forward. Shiro braced one hand on the window and the other on the shelf above the bench seat; the palm print of his right hand only leaving a faint imprint on the cold glass window speckled with rain.


	9. Chapter 9

The dining car was about as big as could be expected; several two-person booths that lined each side of the carriage. At the far end of the second car was a small bar tucked into a corner with an actual, real bartender. Lance stepped through the door that separated the two carriages and after a moment's consideration, made a beeline for the bar.

When he had stepped out of the small box shower shared by the two compartments, Allura had settled under the mess of covers. She watched him get dressed with a lazy expression, but didn't say anything. There really wasn't anything _to_ say, he wagered, and Lance brushed his short brown hair back and shrugged on the shoulder holster he was wearing under the suit coat, opting out of the tie entirely.

Allura sat up on the shallow bed, one hand holding the sheet to her chest but the fabric didn't quite cover the swell of her breasts on both sides. He glanced over at the movement, hesitating only a moment before he shrugged on the suit jacket, covering the shoulder holster. "It's almost time," Lance said. "Aren't you going to get dressed?"

"You don't need to worry about me," Allura said, her voice light.

"I wasn't," Lance said shortly, surprised at the curt words that escaped his mouth. Allura didn't bother to look offended, in fact she almost looked _pleased_ at his reaction, and that was nearly as unsettling. Without any other conversation, Lance slipped out of the private compartment and headed for the dining car. His head didn't feel right.

There were several people in the dining car already, most wearing casual garb but a few in business attire. Leaning a little against the bar Lance ordered the most expensive drink he could think of and charged it to the passenger compartment. As the bartender worked on fixing his drink someone else stepped up to the bar beside him and Lance glanced sideways at Keith.

The tiniest hint of a bruise was forming just above the collar of the tailored suit he wore. Lance snorted as the bartender pushed the drink over to him. "I see you've been busy," he said, and Keith Very Pointedly Ignored Him and ordered two drinks. "You know, I'd advise against getting intimately involved with your partner," Lance said, turning so he was leaning against the bar on his elbow and looking down the length of the dining car. Shiro was not hard to spot, his hair was an easy identifier; and he sat relaxed in a booth, his arm hooked over the back of the seat and legs crossed very loosely, watching them at the bar. "It never ends well."

"You're one to talk," Keith snorted. He cast a weathered eye over Lance and Lance did not self-consciously touch his hair to see if it was dry yet. Keith leaned in closer, so he could speak low without being overheard. "You're not the only one to have fucked her," he hissed without a change in expression. "So don't bother getting cocky." Then he picked up the two lowball glasses and made his way down the carriage to where Shiro sat.

Lance shrugged one shoulder and picked up his own drink. "I'm always cocky," he murmured into the glass, although Keith was clearly out of earshot, and then he turned back to the bar.

 

* * *

 

Hunk had gotten dressed first, unabashed; while Pidge chewed on the end of the pencil that Hunk had used to draw the symbols he had seen on a monitor in the van. They were definitely a language, he could feel it by the flow of the writing, but it was truly unlike any he had studied. She had scanned the image in on her phone and was running it through a system he was fairly sure came directly from the Garrison. It was flashing characters from every known source of language that had been cataloged, both real and fictional; and while her computer was powerful enough to do the search quickly it was held back by the limitations of the internet it was connecting to.

He left her to her work, closing the compartment door behind himself with a reminder about the time dinner would be served. Pidge raised her hand to acknowledge his reminder, but she didn't look up and she didn't stop what she was doing, too far in the zone.

Hunk looked up and down the hallway. He knew the direction of the dining cars would be toward the front of the train, closer to the first-class compartments. He'd stretch his legs a little first. Hunk tugged on the cuff of the tailored jacket and didn't bother wasting the momentum to wonder about when the princess had managed to get his measurements so perfectly.

There were a few passengers about, people who were making trips back and forth to the communal lavatories. The last passenger car ended in a locked door, showing cars behind that carried freight. It was a simple matter to bypass that lock; Hunk very casually forced the door and let himself through.

The key to snooping around was to make certain you looked like you were supposed to be there. It was the first and simplest rule, something that could be taught but for most people came innately. Hunk walked through the first of the freight cars with purpose, glancing over shipping containers and crates; as well as additional luggage brought on by the wealthier patrons fo the train line. The doors between the freight cars weren't locked, unlike the one between the passenger car and the freight, and Hunk slipped into the second car, much like the first.

When he opened the door to the third car he surprised three men sitting around a crate whose top was doubling for a card table.. Their suit jackets were thrown over the back of folding chairs, and at least one still held a full hand fo cards. All three men, burly and thick, with wrestlers' builds, looked up at the interruption.

All of their eyes were yellow.

"Pardon me," Hunk said, and closed the door.

 

* * *

 

There were usually three options available in any given confrontation. The first was fight: which had its advantages even in terrain that he wasn't familiar with. The arena was small and enclosed; with towering crates of shipping containers and various freight lashed to the walls and ground for stability it provided a direct line from point A to point B with no deviation; no way for them to get behind him and cut him off from an escape route and most importantly, no real way for them to come at him in any other formation than one at a time. Of course, all of that was moot if they had guns, which they most likely did – in which case Hunk would get shot and that would be that. The upside to the freightcar was also its drawback – no cover, no place to hide, no easy escape.

All that led into the second option; flight. If he could get out of the freight cars and back to the passenger cars he could ditch them – provided they were not of the type of goon who would go compartment to compartment. There were only so many places to hide on a train for a person of his size. Flight also had the additional peril that these men, whoever they are, might hurt the other passengers, and Hunk wasn't about to endanger anyone else if he could help it.

The third option was one rarely looked at but stood useful all the same: surrender. It was not always the favorable aspect, but sometimes it was best to just throw up your hands and lull the enemy into a false sense of security by submitting to capture, as if you were looking out for your personal number one and not at the benefit of your mission. The trick there was to not end up shot in the face if your enemy wasn't interested in taking prisoners.

All of this flashed through Hunk's head as he heard the door between the freight cars break. He had barely made it to the threshold between the first and second train cars when the door came down and one of the men stepped through. He was not wearing a suit jacket, the dirty white collared shirt had the top few buttons undone and the cuffs rolled halfway up his arms. He didn't appear to have a weapon in his hand, which was encouraging. The man would not have looked out of place at any of the pubs along the strip; except for the distinctly unnatural look of his eyes. Hunk kept his back to the door, and his stance low, watching the man without flinching.

Option one, it was.

 

* * *

 

The dining car was about half full by the time Pidge walked through the door. Not long after Hunk had left she'd decided to see what exactly the "princess" (Pidge would bet cash money hard on the fact that the woman wasn't a princess at all) had in store for her. To her surprise, when she'd unzipped the opaque clothing bag, it was also a trim, tailored suit. Grudgingly, Pidge noted that as one point in the woman's favor, and when the suit fit her exactly, she would be forced to add on an additional point. Grateful to be free of the accursed wig, Pidge slicked back her hair and forewent the glasses, stepping into the first dining car right on time.

Shiro and Keith were sitting together in a booth not far from the door. Four people could squeeze into it if they were feeling adventuresome; but they each occupied their opposite sides of the booth fully. Shiro's back was to the door, although he tilted his head back as she stalked past with purpose, refusing to meet either of their eyes.

Lance stood at the bar alone in a similarly tailored suit dark suit with a blue shirt. He looked over at Pidge and nodded his head appreciatively. "Not bad, pipsqueak," he said with a smirk, and Pidge ignored him.

"Have you got anything out of her?" Pidge asked instead of engaging with Lance when he was clearly in the mood to be a massive dick. At the way his smirk shifted and settled she groaned and said, "anything _useful_?"

"Depends on your definition of useful," Lance said thoughtfully, and picked up the drink on the bar in front of him.

Lance moved a short way away, to a booth against the wall of the train, framed by a dark window lashed with rain. It wasn't particularly close to Shiro's booth, and after a moment Pidge followed him, sliding into the seat opposite. "Hunk thinks there's something fishy, and I do too," Pidge said. "He found all sorts of weird writing in their van, and I can't match it to any known writing system."

"Pidge, you're so paranoid," Lance said, and there was a mockingly affectionate undertone to his voice. "It's adorable."

She bristled. "You're drunk."

"Not particularly." Lance looked at his glass and frowned. "Not even a little, actually. They mix the drinks weak here, it's criminal." He looked back up to Pidge's expression. "I was the one who didn't want to go along with this," he reminded her. "Don't tell me you're getting second thoughts now."

"It's not second thoughts," Pidge said. "There's something else going on here that she's not telling us, and I think they," she tilted her head back just a little, indicating the table that Shiro and Keith sat at, "know what's up."

Lance was silent a long moment. "What does Hunk think?" he said.

"Hunk's suspicious," she said. She looked up and down the dining car, brow furrowed as if she was just recognizing the fact that Hunk's presence was missing from the conversation at hand. "Speaking of," she said. "Where the heck is he? He left before I did."

"Probably in the other car," Lance said. "I hadn't cleared both, I saw the bar, and," he shrugged his shoulders lightly. "This is the lounge area, the food's through there. That's where I'd be, if I was Hunk."

Pidge gave him a Look and Lance shrugged again. "We help her stop this GALRA organization, save the world, get paid and retire. I don't really care what her reasons are for it, and neither should you." Pidge kept staring at him strangely, and then leaned forward.

"You slept with her already," Pidge said, appalled.

Lance didn't respond and took a sip of his drink.

"Oh my _god_ , Lance. Can't you keep your dick in your pants for three consecutive days?" Pidge groaned and propped her chin in her hand. "You're so useless. We should have you fixed like a dog."

" _Hey_ ," Lance said. "I don't let it affect our missions."

"Yeah, sure you don't," Pidge muttered. She slid out of the booth. "I'm going to go find Hunk, he's the last one of us with any sense left in his head. Can I trust you not to trip and stick your dick in anything else for a few hours?"

Lance said, "you know I outrank you, right?"

Pidge rolled her eyes exaggeratedly. "You know that all that went out the window when we went rogue on the Garrison, _right?_ " She slammed the palm of her hand against the end of the table and leaned forward. "I don't trust her, Lance," she said in a low voice. "And neither should you. We can still take them all in, if it comes down to it."

"Yeah," Lance said. "What do you think I've been keeping in my back pocket?" He took a long pull of his drink, and Pidge inclined her head in half a nod, before straightening and heading toward the other dining car.

 

* * *

 

"They're up to something," Keith said around his scotch.

"Of course they're up to something," Shiro's voice was mild. "They're Garrison-trained, they don't trust us and we don't trust them. It's not exactly the best recipe to start with." His own drink sat on the table still, mostly untouched. He tapped the fingers of his right hand along the table's edge, the heavy ping of them noticeable. "I should check on Allura," he said, and Keith raised an eyebrow, still holding his glass close to his mouth.

" _Now_ who's jealous?" he murmured, and was gratified at the very faint blush that appeared under the faded scar. "Yeah, go on," he said, and Shiro stood up from the table. "I'm drinking your bourbon if you don't come back soon," he added, as Shiro disappeared out the door. Keith sat down his glass and sighed, and glanced toward the dark window that the booth framed. The only thing he could see was his own reflection, staring back at him.

Well, he wasn't going to sulk until Shiro came back, not when he had other options.

Keith slid out of the booth as well, picked up Shiro's drink in his other hand, and walked the length of the car before setting both drinks down on Lance's table. Lance had been looking out the window in a skewed mirror image of Keith a moment before, and his expression changed in the reflection, brow downturned, before he looked over at Keith proper.

Without waiting for an acknowledgment or an invitation (that he knew would not come), Keith seated himself opposite Lance. "We don't have to get along," Keith said. "But we are supposed to be working together."

Lance's scowl only deepened, and Keith kicked back the last of his scotch, switching his attention to the lowball glass of bourbon. It was going to be a long night.

 

 

 


	10. Chapter 10

"It's open," Allura's voice sang from inside the compartment. Shiro hesitated a moment despite the open invitation, wondering if the princess had anticipated his arrival, and then dismissed the thought, opening the door confidently. She was seated primly in the chair that sat opposite the bed, close enough that her foot could touch the mattress if she was so inclined. She was dressed in a sleeveless violet gown made of a soft material that shimmered in the overhead light. It had a high neck and a low back, and Allura was putting on her earrings.

"I was expecting Keith," Allura said without glancing at Shiro's straight-backed posture in the door. She fastened her second earring and cocked her head a little, looking Shiro up and down with her eyebrow raised. Then, effortlessly, she rose to her feet and turned a small, abbreviated twirl. "What do you think?"

"I think you're overdressed for dinner," Shiro said, and Allura laughed.

"How are they all getting along?" Allura waited until Shiro offered his arm, and then linked hers with his. "Have we lost any of them, yet?"

"Not yet, although I left Keith alone with your new toy, so we'll see if the dining car is still in one piece when we arrive." They swept into the hall and Allura hesitated, which made Shiro pause as well. He knew that look well, and had learned to trust it over the past weeks. Allura's expression had changed to something far-away, and concentrating. Then she looked down the hall in the opposite direction, sourcing. "Allura?"

"They're here," she said.

"Sendak?" Shiro's stomach dropped. They were ill-equipped at the moment to deal with Sendak. They barely had twenty-four hours under their belts, a clash with someone that well-organized could be disastrous ... and very lethal.

"Not him personally, but his men." Allura said. Her expression returned to normal, and she shook her head, her long, unbound hair barely moving with the motion. "There's trouble, Shiro."

"I'm not surprised," Shiro said. "Toward the back of the train? I'll check it out," he moved to unlink their arms, and then tapped one finger to the rise of his cheek. Allura stared at him a moment then comprehended, running two fingers over her own cheek, disguising the glowing pink mark that had appeared. "You need to tell them," he said softly, and Allura caught his arm with one hand, her expression for a split-second, terrified.

"I lost my team once," she said, and then remembered herself and released his sleeve. Shiro stood a moment and looked at her, then took her left hand with his own and raised it, bowing his head to kiss her hand.

"We won't fail you, princess," Shiro murmured. Then he released her hand and straightened, settling his jacket on his shoulders before heading with purpose toward the end of the passenger car and the end of the train.

"I know you won't," Allura murmured, cupping her left hand to her chest with her right.

 

* * *

Hunk knew how to take a hit.

Didn't mean he liked being in the position of getting hit one bit, but he at least had plenty of practice with it. It was something that tended to come up when you ended up with friends like Lance McClain, who dragged you after through hell and back and then didn't even have their shit together enough to call you the next morning. Hunk's shoulder clipped a shipping crate that didn't even move with the impact, and he barely had it together enough to remember to move before the mook with the grin and the missing tooth took his block clean off.

He dented the side of the shipping crate that Hunk had very hastily scrambled away from. He filed that thought, along with the half-dozen others that had occurred to him in the ten-minute span that had started out as a fair fight and had quickly devolved into something else altogether.

These men weren't men at all.

Well no, that wasn't quite right, Hunk reasoned as he tried to gather his scattered thoughts. They were clearly functioning, breathing beings made of carbon -- but they didn't hit like a human, and they certainly weren't bothering to get tired like regular old human Hunk was. He was still facing off against the first one who had a thin trickle of blood coming from his nose, a missing tooth and  _ yellow fucking eyes _ .

"Stop toyin' with him," the one in the back said. The other two had at first squared off as well, prepared to take Hunk down if their comrade fell. When it quickly became apparent that that wasn't going to happen they relaxed their stances, and one in fact had lit a cigar, standing by the door broken off its track between the second and third freight cars. "We're supposed to bring'im all to the boss, not kill'em."

"Yeah, but you know how wily these stupid fucking humans can be," the second one said conversationally. "Annoying little shits, don't see why we have to keep workin' with them."

"Rules," the third one said.

Whatever the second one was about to say in response to that was interrupted cleanly by Hunk slammed directly into the undamaged door. "Shouldn't've come meddlin'," the first one growled, his voice thick and animalistic. Hunk, dazed and off balance, was halfway to regaining his feet when the door actually slid aside. He toppled with it, falling down on one knee and spitting blood, looking up and expecting to see the fourth member of their gang come to finish the deal.

To his surprise, there stood Shiro; dressed similarly. He had forgone the tie with his suit, and the top few buttons of the white collared shirt undone. The large man who had been making Hunk's life difficult threw a punch at Shiro without even hesitating. Several things happened so fast that Hunk could barely follow it himself.

Shiro stepped in toward the punch, throwing up his left arm and extending it. The tie he must have been wearing earlier looped over the man's wrist and Shiro turned easily, almost as if it were a dance move. The man's followthrough was extended by Shiro yanking him with the tie and it slammed his face off the frame of the open door. The man howled through a smashed face, falling forward. Without looking at the damage done behind him, Shiro stepped forward toward the two other men, left hand sliding under his suit jacket and drawing a small hand gun.

Hunk got to his feet slowly, wiping his bruised fist over his mouth as he watched Shiro shoot the other two men with deadly efficiency. One bullet each took them down, but then Shiro stepped over the bodies and unloaded a few more shots directly into them, the retort ungodly loud in the small space. "I think they're plenty dead," Hunk said, as Shiro popped the cartridge from his gun.

The one who Shiro had knocked senseless into the door was getting to his feet, spitting blood and broken teeth. He also was starting to look very different, face growing thicker and his untrimmed sideburns going a deep, dark violet. "Shiro," Hunk said, and Shiro half turned, already aiming his weapon.

The -- whatever the heck he was, moved faster than Hunk thought possible, slamming forward into Shiro and knocking the gun clear from his hand. Shiro let out an awful, pained sound as they both went over, tumbling back over the bodies of it's slain comrades. Hunk lunged after them, intent on helping Shiro, weapon or no weapon. The creature had Shiro pinned to the floor, one claw-tipped, purple hand over Shiro's throat and face, the other raised to strike.

Hunk put his shoulder down and slammed into its side like a linebacker. It wasn't enough momentum to completely dislodge the thing, but Shiro's right hand flung free and grabbed the thing by the face, and as Hunk clambered to his feet to try again there was a  _ sizzling _ noise and it screamed in pain, flinging itself off of Shiro and across the car. Hunk was prepared to rush it but it groped along the wall behind it and found a latch, popping the freight car's door. With one hand cupped over its injured face the thing threw the door open and threw itself out into the dark night.

He rushed the door but the train was moving at enough speed that it was gone in a flash. The wind that whipped by was cold but not wet, although the outside of the train was. He held onto the compartment's door for balance, then looked over to Shiro, who had sat up, left hand holding his right wrist and folded over himself a bit, breathing hard. "What the fuck did you  _ do _ ?" Hunk breathed raggedly through a split lip. "What  _ was _ that, some sort of fucking werewolf beast man shit, jesus  _ christ- _ " he slammed his hand against the open compartment door, blood still running from his nose and mouth. "What the fuck, what the  _ fuck- _ "

Shiro did not respond and Hunk looked at him again, folded over himself and Hunk realized whatever he was cradling was  _ glowing. _ "Shiro?" Hunk said, and moved toward him. Shiro lifted his head wildly, eyes wide and almost one solid color, reflecting the strange pinkish-purple hue that was emanating from his right arm. "What the fuck," Hunk breathed as Shiro's eyes went back to normal, but the arm did not stop glowing. "What is going  _ on? _ "

"Long story," Shiro said, his voice strangled. "You might want to, uh, leave." He was still holding his arm close to his chest, and Hunk could see the entire thing was glowing underneath the long sleeve of his jacket. "Before it overloads and explodes."

"Oh,  _ hell _ no," Hunk said, and grabbed Shiro's arm by the wrist.

"Hunk!" Shiro yelled and tried to yank his arm back. It was hot to the touch, and the heat coming off the palm was scalding. Hunk shoved his sleeve up past his elbow as Shiro tried to yank his arm free again. "You have to uncouple the car, if it goes this time it will take half the train with it-"

"Shiro, shut the fuck up," Hunk said. The arm was clearly a prosthetic now, but it was light years ahead of anything he'd seen in the military. It was the right weight and thickness of a proper arm, and he suspected that it even generated warmth like a real limb. Somehow, Shiro had been able to override the controls that provided the low-level of heat and that was what was causing the overload. "There has to be a seam on here, if I can reroute the power source--"

" _ Hunk! _ "

"Shut up and let me work," he said. "Maybe get talking as to what the fuck this thing is, or what they were, because oh boy if you think  _ I _ have a lot of questions just wait until Pidge gets ahold of you."

That seemed to get through to him, and Shiro let out a long, ragged breath and stopped struggling against Hunk. "It's stupid for both of us to die," he said.

"Then we'd better not," Hunk said, popping the panel at Shiro's wrist and exposing a rat's nest of wires.

 

* * *

Hunk had not been in the proper dining car. Pidge had walked the length of it -- the cars weren't so long that you couldn't see from one end to the other easily, but she was nothing if not thorough. Beyond the dining car was staff area and while she had the swagger to march herself right through the door she somehow never managed it with the ease that the others did. Someone always questioned her -- she supposed it didn't help that she looked like a sixteen-year-old boy and not a man.

Going back through the lounge car she stopped at Lance's table, which had been co-opted by Keith. "Hunk's not in the dining car," she reported. "Where did Shiro go?"

"Gone to fuck the princess," Keith said, and that earned a choked noise from Lance, who slammed his drink down on the table and glared at Keith. Pidge rolled her eyes, not interested in the slightest in their macho hatred one-up competition, and said, "I'm going to to check the rest of the train."

"Got it," Lance said. "Don't slip through any cracks along the way."

It was an old game they played, and Pidge's venom was usually real. "I  _ really _ despise you," she said.

"It's why we work so well together," Lance said, which was, unfortunately, the truth. Pidge flipped him off and continued on down the train's dining car, somewhat amazed at this point that none of the other passengers had complained about Lance and Keith's obvious antagonism.

It wasn't as late as the darkness outside the windows made it feel. She pushed past a cluster of passengers and saw Allura at the end of a passenger car in a gorgeous, shimmery violet dress. She was about to open her mouth to say something when she realized a large man was standing beside her, and he had his arm in tight, elbow locked almost to his side.  _ Gun. On her. _

Pidge didn't usually see action, not like Lance or Hunk. That didn't mean she wasn't capable of taking care of herself; all of the Garrison's agents were fully trained with the expectations of field work. She specialized in the more covert ops, though -- deep undercover, intel, infiltration -- and straightforward rushes at men who had a foot of height and a hundred pounds on her was definitely not the norm.

But it was instinctual.

Pidge didn't yell or give any warning; she just rushed the man. They both heard the slam of her feet on the carpet and he was already turning to see what was going on when Pidge put her shoulder directly into his solar plexus. He whuffed out a noise of pain and grabbed for her but she was already spinning on one foot, slamming her heel into his shin just right, trying to fracture something, grabbing Allura at the same time, trying to yank her away. "Pidge!" Allura said -- it wasn't a yell or a scream but her voice was louder than usual, commanding, "no, Pidge,  _ run-" _

He grabbed her by the back of her jacket and she tried to jerk away but this man was larger and stronger than she was. Slipping out of the jacket was her next option but then he picked her up with one hand and, as Pidge wrenched her shoulders and tried to go limp in time to slip free, he slammed her into the wall hard enough she saw stars. " _ Pidge! _ " Allura yelled for certain this time and she had both her arms around the man's arm that held Pidge. He slammed her into the wall a second time before Allura yanked with her entire weight and that threw the man off balance, startled enough so that he dropped Pidge. She landed hard, delirious but not unconscious, and was in the process of trying to get to her feet when the man pulled something out of his jacket and said in a gravelly, unnatural tone, "I tried to be polite, Princess..."

Pidge heard Allura scream, or she thought she did ... either way, it was the last thing she remembered.

 


	11. Chapter 11

Hunk twisted two wires together and the glow emanating from Shiro's right arm abruptly cut out. Shiro let out a low, exhausted noise but Hunk was still focused on the wiring, tucking it back into the open panel at Shiro's wrist. "I couldn't get at the power source," he said. "Not without tools. You're gonna have some loss in function I guess, but that's better than worrying about it blowing up on you." Shiro did not move his arm or twitched his fingers at all until Hunk had reseated the panel. "I need a full workbench, but give me three days and I bet I can tweak it not to do this shit at all." Hunk sat back, breathing hard, on the floor of the freight car. "Pidge can probably do it faster, though," he added with a snort.

Shiro was looking down at his hand, his right wrist cradled in his left hand. "Aren't you going to ask what it is?" he asked quietly, and Hunk snorted again, then wiped his hand over his nose, leaving a streak of half-dry blood on the back of his hand.

"Damn fucking straight I am," Hunk said. "Because this is a whole lot more nonsense than I signed on for." The freight car's door clattered a bit, still open to the night, and Hunk looked in its direction, on edge immediately in case that purple thing was clinging to the outside of the train car, just waiting for the proper moment to spring out all horror-movie-ending at them both. He hauled to his feet and approached the door, one hand on a safety pull with the intention of closing the open door.

There were trucks, running alongside the train. Off-road, all-black covert military trucks; Hunk was familiar with the type, he'd been on many in the past. There was an entire caravan of matched vehicles, at least a half-dozen, their headlights on but dim. "What the _hell_ -" Hunk said, putting his back to the frame, holding on to the doors tight. He didn't know how fast they were going, but they were going _fast_ , and the truck caravan was keeping pace. Shiro had looked up, and hauled himself to his feet. "Half-dozen gun trucks," Hunk said. "Keeping pace."

"What?" Shiro used his left hand to hang on to the frame and looked out as well – at the same time that they both witnessed something moving from the train to one of the trucks in the middle of the caravan, an exchange happening at deadly high speeds. Two bodies, gone limp. Shiro's voice cut high and loud, the realization setting in. " _Allura!_ "

Hunk caught Shiro by the back of the suit jacket he still wore and hauled him backwards before he could try to do anything as stupid as was surely going through his mind. Shiro was large, and heavier than he looked and that meant that pulling his entire weight back caused Hunk to pitch back as well. This action saved them both as a black-clad sentry on the rear gun truck had turned at the noise – how he had heard Shiro over the clatter and noise of the rail car Hunk didn't understand, but he sure did hear him because the next thing that happened was the even louder sound of a short spray of automatic gunfire. "Those are Sendak's men," Shiro said, on his hands and knees and casting about for the gun that had been dropped earlier. "They have the princess!"

"And Pidge," Hunk said, jaw clenched. He pushed himself back to his feet and scrambled for the frame, but even as he did so they both saw several of the gun trucks skid past, slowed considerably now that their cargo was removed from the train. Hunk stood in the open door of the freight car and watched as the convoy turned and began to cut away from the train track, growing smaller by the split second. Shiro had joined him, and they both watched in silence until the train track curved away, headed toward the mountain.

 

* * *

 

"What the hell happened?" Keith said, standing in the compartment. Hunk was seated on the bench beside the window, Pidge's laptop on his knees as he frowned at it. Shiro was seated opposite him; looking bedraggled. Lance had slid into the compartment before Keith had and was sitting to Hunk's right, his arms folded. "You both look like shit."

"Sendak happened," Shiro said. "He's been here. He took the Princess. And," Shiro added, casting a glance at Lance and not Hunk, who had his nose buried in the laptop. "Katie."

Lance was ready to kill someone; and Keith was the closest option. "How did he even get on the train?" Lance's voice was tight and clipped, and Keith shook his head bewildered, looking at Shiro with the most confusion Lance had seen on his face in the short span he'd known him. "We had a copy of the passenger list. I thought this was all dealt with already."

"He couldn't have been on the train," Keith said, still staring at Shiro. "I'd've known. The _Princess_ would have known..."

"Oh yeah, Allura would have known," Lance said. "She would have magically sensed Sendak's evil, evil presence and would have been able to warn us all." He scoffed loudly at this, and looked to Hunk, finally. "Have you got anything?"

"Nothing yet," Hunk said. "I don't think they'd find her tracker, but there's always the chance some kind of freaky alien tech could disable it." He was silent a moment while typing. "If she's even still alive to activate it."

"If Sendak wanted them dead he wouldn't have bothered pulling them off the train," Shiro said firmly, his voice tired. "They are most certainly still alive."

"For now," Keith said in a low tone, under his breath. Shiro shot him a glare, which Keith ignored.

"Can we _not_ do this?" Hunk snapped, looking up sharply. Keith looked over to Hunk with surprise, and Shiro looked away. "I want a full explanation of what the _fuck_ I witnessed in there. Shiro's arm included."

Lance cocked his head and looked at Lance, then over to Shiro. "What is he talking about?"

Shiro started unbuttoning the cuff of his right sleeve. "Shiro," Keith said suddenly, apprehensive, and Shiro shook his head firmly.

"No, Keith," Shiro said. "They need to know what we're really up against."

"Yeah, I _really_ don't like the sound of that," Lance said as Shiro held up an arm that was plainly obviously not flesh. "What _is_ that?"

"Some sort of high tech prosthetic," Hunk said. "Not like anything I've ever seen before."

"I doubt you have," Shiro said. "It's not exactly from around here."

"No shit," Hunk muttered, and flipped the laptop's screen over to its tablet form. On it was the writing he had copied by memory and Pidge had scanned into the database, it had long since come back as no matches. "I bet it goes with this fancy chicken scratch, right?"

"Where did you get _that_?" Keith said, almost angry, taking a step forward that was abbreviated by Lance sticking his leg out, stopping Keith physically. " _How_ did you get that?"

Lance smirked without mirth. "Hunk's got a photographic memory," he informed Keith smugly.

"Semi-photographic," Hunk said, but he was still looking at Shiro. "Is this Galran writing?" he asked, and Shiro shook his head negatively. "Altean, then."

"It is Altean," Shiro said. He sighed deeply and sat forward, propping his elbows on his knees. "This is difficult to explain without sounding ridiculous," he said slowly, then looked to Keith. "Maybe it would be easier to show them."

"No," Keith said. "Absolutely not."

"If somebody doesn't start making sense soon, I'm out of here," Lance said. "We're sitting around with our thumbs up our asses while Pidge and Allura are be carted off to who-knows-where."

"GALRA isn't just a military organization trying to seize control behind the scenes," Keith said. "They're actually aliens."

Lance barked a short laugh of disbelief.

"Keith," Shiro said firmly.

"He's not lying," Hunk said, and Lance turned a look of sheer disbelief on him. "I saw one of them. Or rather, what one of them turned into." He touched the swelling around his eye tenderly. "Do you really think I'd let one guy do this to me?"

"I figured they ganged up on you," Lance said. "An _alien_ , Hunk? You sure you aren't just concussed?" He reached over one hand as if to catch the back of Hunk's head to inspect it, but Hunk batted his hand away. "That's crazy talk." He leaned back in his seat, arms folded, unconvinced. "Besides, if they _were_ aliens, why haven't they come in with their giant spaceships, guns all blasting? What the hell good does it do _aliens_ to sneak around but be obvious enough that they get picked up on by multiple organizations? That story has more holes in it than a bathroom stall at a truck stop."

"They're not here to take over the government or start a fight," Shiro said. "If they had, Sendak's ship would have obliterated a small country or two. They want something, and--" Shiro cast a glance at Keith, who shrugged a little. "We're not entirely sure _what_."

"Pretty sure Allura knows," Keith said. "But she hasn't really shared that with us yet. Just that we have to get to whatever it is first."

"So, what, is Allura an alien princess then?" Lance said, and rolled his eyes expressively.

"Yes," Shiro and Keith said at the same time.

Lance looked over to Hunk. "Are you hearing what I'm hearing? They're completely fruit loops. Absolutely bonkers."

"You wouldn't think that so much if you saw what I did," Hunk said. He looked up form the laptop again, at Lance. "You're the one who slept with her, Lance, shouldn't there be something said for your level of obliviousness?"

"Man, she had all the right bits," he said. "What more do you want from me? Don't answer that." Lance waved his hand in the air. "Okay, let's pretend I buy this alien crap for thirty seconds. What exactly is the endgame, here? We find this whatever-the-hell thing first ... then what? if they're really aliens, can't they just nuke the fuck out of us, retrieve whatever it is they're looking for and take a giant steaming load on the rest of the planet? What, exactly, is gonna stop _that_ from happening?"

Shiro and Keith glanced at each other, and Lance let out a loud, exaggerated sigh. "I _knew_ it," he huffed.

"Hey," Hunk said. "Pidge's tracker went live."

That was a suitable enough distraction for the three of them, they all turned their attention to Hunk. "Where is she?" Lance asked, leaning to the left to try to look at what Hunk was holding.

"I'm waiting for GPS to start pulling coordinates," Hunk said, "but she's at least stationary for the moment. That's something."

"Sendak's base," Keith breathed, and Shiro shook his head.

"There's no way Sendak would be so careless," he said. "They'll find the tracker or otherwise disable it before they get there."

"Either way," Hunk said. "It's a starting point. It's not like we're going to be able to get off this train before morning."

"Everyone should get some rest," Shiro said. "I have a feeling we're not going to be getting a lot of it going forward."

 

* * *

 

Pidge first became aware of the swaying, violent motion of a vehicle. She was being bounced around a bit, but her head was cushioned on something soft. That didn't stop her head from aching; if she didn't know better she would think she'd been hit by a bus. Opening her eyes would be a mistake at the moment so she focused in on not being sick and fighting back the throbbing pain.

The rocking and jolting read as a military vehicle with shitty shocks. She'd been in her fair share of those on the Garrison and deployed in the field; this one was exceptionally shitty. There wasn't much by way of conversations but she knew she wasn't alone, she could sense as much. Cracking open one eye hurt more than she expected but she did it anyway; the interior of the vehicle was dark, illuminated only by the faint light that filtered in through the small windows. However, that faint light did catch the glint of metal opposite her; weapons out and held tight.

She felt the softness shift and realized with an embarrassed flush lost to the darkness that her face was resting on someone's lap. Someone soft and feminine, who smelled almost intoxicatingly good.

_Shit, her face was buried in Allura's lap._

A small shift with the intention of pushing herself up made Pidge realize a few other things – one of which was that her hands were bound behind her back; heavy metal cuffs digging into the flesh of her wrists. The other was that there was a soft, firm hand that rested between her shoulder blades, and when Pidge shifted with clear intentions of trying to rise to her knees, that hand pressed down insistently. Then, _tap. Tap. Tap tap._

One finger, tapping between her shoulder blades.

In Morse code.

Pidge closed her eyes and left her head on Allura's lap as she counted out the taps. _Not alone. Still danger. Stay still._

_Sendak._

Pidge had never seen the man nor heard the name a week ago, but the way that Allura tapped the letters made her stomach churn. She took a deep, steadying breath and curled her hands. The military vehicle continued off-road and into the night.

 

 


	12. Chapter 12

Hunk let out a long, exaggerated sigh as Lance gently washed the dried blood from his cheek. Lance had taken off the suit jacket but not the shirt, rolling his cuffs to his elbows and fetching lukewarm water from the tap in the small lavatory between the compartments. This was exactly like Hunk to ignore himself and just keep trucking forward like nothing at all had happened, like nothing at all was wrong. He flinched a little at Lance's rough cleaning of his face, and Lance could only think smugly, _good._

"It really freaks me out when you get all mother-hen," Hunk said, seated on the edge of the mattress of the compartment's bed. The sheets had been turned out and tucked back in, and Lance hadn't even thought about that there might be a maid service on board to do such a thing while they were out of the compartment. "It's not like you at _all._ "

"What, I can't worry about my best friend's welfare?" Lance dunked the washcloth in the shallow pan he was using, the water had gone murky.

"You don't fuck your best friend and then ghost," Hunk said pointedly while Lance's back was turned, and Lance stilled.

"I didn't mean for it to go that far," Lance said quietly.

"No _shit._ " There was anger and hurt in Hunk's voice and Lance finally mustered up the courage to look back at him. Hunk wasn't looking at Lance at all, but staring at the wall past him. "I don't have any problem with fucking for the sake of it, but it wasn't _that_ at all, was it."

Lance _hated_ rhetorical questions. Especially ones that sounded rhetorical but weren't, ones that he was expected to look Hunk in the eye and answer why he had slipped out of the hotel room, why he had left and hadn't looked back. Particularly when he himself still wasn't even sure of the reasons behind his choices.

Hunk groaned a little and put his hand in his hair, pushing his fingers back through it. "I don't even know why I'm bringing this up _now_ ," he said, saving Lance from the sort of introspection that he needed more than a glass of whiskey to delve into.

"I told you, you're probably concussed," Lance said. "You're fantastic at leading with your fists, Hunk."

"Ha ha," Hunk said dryly. "Tell that again when Pidge is here, she'll laugh her way into an aneurysm."

He sat down on the mattress heavily beside Hunk, who looked over at him in surprise. He took a deep breath. "It was going to be something more than sex," he said. "And I couldn't handle that." The smile he gave Hunk was watery. "Probably still can't, if I'm being honest."

Lance jumped when Hunk put his arm over Lance's shoulder. "You're so cute when you're being vulnerable, McClain."

" _Hey_ ," Lance said, offended, and Hunk laughed again, a real, honest belly laugh. Lance smiled a little in return, grateful at to know that this, at least, would be okay.

 

* * *

 

It was early morning when the train reached its destination. The village had a front-facing tourism industry, making it small and quaint and full enough of foreigners that they wouldn't stand out by much. It sat at the base of a mountain range and the air had a chill, crisp quality to it. Despite the storm they had passed through in the night the skies were blue and the sun was bright. They'd made it to their destination.

Keith stood beside Hunk; who despite having cleaned up overnight still wore his clothes from the previous evening. The suit jacket was a little frayed but most obvious were the bloodstains on the collar and the small splatter of it down the front of the yellow button-up shirt. "Gives the shirt character," Hunk grunted when Keith raised his eyebrow at him.

Shiro was on the phone with someone. Lance had his arms crossed and was turned half in the direction that Shiro stood, clearly trying to listen in. "I thought you, cyborg, and the Princess were the whole operation," Lance said to Keith.

"You're on a need to know basis," Keith said. "You don't need to know."

Watching the storm clouds gather on Lance's face gave Keith some small modicum of pleasure, given that he had been unable to sleep and spent most of the night obsessively cleaning and checking his weapons.

Disappointingly, Lance did not blow his stack. After a few tense moments he turned his scowl on Hunk. "Did we ever get the coordinates? And did the tracker ever go off?"

"It went off about three a.m. local time," Hunk said. "Looks like it was deactivated via pulse, so the actual tracker wasn't destroyed. Pidge is _probably_ okay." He had kept the laptop converted to its tablet mode, and had Pidge's duffel full of electronic gizmos slung over his shoulder. "We shouldn't waste any time, though."

Shiro approached the group again, phone lowered from his ear. "Double whammy," he said, and Keith groaned. "We've got a good satellite fix on Sendak's base camp. We can get there in less than a day."

"Okay, that's good," Lance said. "Not the best, but good. Why the double whammy?"

Shiro glanced at Keith, and Keith was _really_ hating the fact that Shiro looked at him like that in front of _them_. It was just asking for all sorts of issues, especially when Lance said, "I'm beginning to recognize that as the 'crazy alien shit that Lance doesn't believe in how do we soften the blow' look."

"They're resonating," Shiro said. "We're close to one of the weapons."

"Oh, they're weapons now," Lance said. "You _do_ know what it is they're looking for." He elbowed Hunk, who was staring down at the tablet. "They're _weapons_ , Hunk."

"No shit they are," Hunk muttered. "Where have you been, Lance? Do you really think aliens would be infiltrating society looking around for a tea set?" He looked up, at Shiro. "What is it that's resonating?"

Shiro hesitated, looking to Keith, who waved one hand dismissively. "It's not important," Keith said, then he looked at Shiro. "You take them, go after the princess. I'll find it." Shiro's frown deepened, and Lance held up both hands.

"Hey now, wait," he said. "You're not really going to let that guy go find some kind of super secret alien WMD all by himself. We shouldn't be splitting up."

"Sendak's close to here because he has a resonation system too," Shiro said. "We don't have the time to do one, then the other. We have to hit Sendak fast to rescue the princess, but if we focus all of our attention on that then Sendak might beat us to ... it."

"You _do_ know what it is," Lance said. "You hesitated."

"Keith, take Lance with you," Shiro said. "Hunk, you're with me. We'll reconvene back here in forty-eight hours."

"Understood," Keith said with a brisk nod.

"Roger," Hunk said, slipping the tablet into his bag.

"No fucking _way_ ," Lance said. "Send Hunk with wonder mullet, you need my eye if you're going to infiltrate a base." He hesitated a moment, and then said, "why the fuck am I taking orders from you in the _first_ place-"

"Lance," Hunk said, "shut the fuck up and go with Keith."

Lance and Hunk glared at each other for a second, and then Lance sighed and brushed a hand back through his hair. " _Fine_ ," he said. He glared at Shiro for a moment, but Shiro didn't seem the slightest bit intimidated by the expression.

Keith rolled his eyes, arms folded. "Come on, McClain," he said. "We've got work to do."

 

* * *

 

Allura was gorgeous in the early morning light. The dress she had been wearing on the train shimmered, and her hands were unbound. Her long hair was loose too, cascading down her mostly-bare back. She stood defiantly outside the gun truck, back held regally straight and chin aloft. Pidge, on the other hand, felt like she'd been road-hauled; her suit was a rumpled mess and her hair was a mess. She however stood as straight as she could with her hands cuffed behind her back.

There were men in black covert ops clothes all around. They looked very generic in an unnervingly unnatural way. Pidge had tried to keep count of how man she'd seen but lost track very quickly.

They had been off-road for hours, until they ended up on an old dirt road. The compound they were at was an old, old structure – half in ruins. There was a full guard and perimeter, and aside from these gun trucks looked like there were plenty of temporary fortifications to keep the location secure. They seemed to be out in the middle of nowhere, though, in the midst of green fields and clusters of trees dwarfed by snow capped mountains in the distance.

The compound wasn't what had her attention at the moment, though. Pidge knew she'd taken some hits to the head and was probably suffering from some sort of traumatic head injury. That was really the only explanation for what she was seeing. "Sendak," Allura said the name distastefully as the man seemed to unfold out of the low entrance to the building before them. At least, Pidge had assumed it was a man; dressed in a sharply tailored grey suit -- but he was much taller than Allura, who was very tall herself. Also ... he was purple. And furry.

Yup, head injury.

"Princess Allura," Sendak almost _purred_. "What a pleasure it is to finally meet." He glanced over to Pidge and his one eye widened a little. "And _Holt?_ " Her back straightened further as the familiarity there made her stomach _roil_. "No," he said, his voice still a rumble. "Too small." He leaned down a bit, closer to Pidge's level, and, horrifyingly, _sniffed_. "And female."

"You will release my attendant," Allura said. It was not a request nor phrased as such, and Sendak laughed.

"There is no harm," he said, and gestured at one of the black-clad men standing around. He approached Pidge and released the cuffs, and Pidge rubbed her wrists in the vain hope of restoring circulation quickly. "There is nowhere to flee to." His grin was wicked and sharp. "Zarkon will be most pleased when I present him with the Princess of Altea."

Allura did not respond to this, and Sendak leaned forward quickly and grabbed one of her hands. Pidge was too sluggish to respond and even so her smallest movement made the men around them raise their automatic weapons warningly. "You won't be needing this," Sendak said, and slipped a large purple finger into the teal-inset bracelet Allura was wearing. She snarled and tried to yank her arm free but he snapped the edge of the bracelet. It fell to the ground, and when Pidge looked back at Allura, she had to do a double-take.

Her ears had grown longer, out of the sides of her hair. There was also a faint pink glow to her cheeks, like something was covered by makeup, beneath the surface. "That's better," Sendak said, and looked to Pidge's response with some amusement. "It seems your attendant was in the dark with regards to your true nature. Perhaps you will enlighten her." He turned to leave, waving a hand in the air.

"This is not your victory," Allura said, as two of the black-clad men moved forward, one grabbing her arm roughly and the other grabbing Pidge's.

"And yet, I now hold the most valuable piece," Sendak called as the men propelled them forward, toward the compound's entrance. "Enjoy your stay, Princess. It will be your last under a blue sky."

 

* * *

 

The first thing they did, annoyingly, was purchase a hotel room. Lance flirted idly with the woman behind the desk who had a thick accent and blonde, curly hair that framed her face while Keith put down for the room. He ignored Keith's look of disgust until they were in the elevator. "She was cute," Lance said in his defense. "You should loosen up, find a quick fuck. It would do wonders for all that tension you hold in your shoulders."

"I am not tense," Keith managed to keep from snarling, but just barely.

Lance raised an eyebrow at the room, it was clearly a luxury suite. It also, conspicuously, only had one bed. "Oh, _now_ I get it," Lance said.

"I will shoot you if you try anything," Keith put the duffel Hunk had handed off on a table. "This isn't to sleep, anyway." He pulled out his phone and pressed some buttons on the side, then proceeded to start running it over the walls and doors. Lance watched him finish scanning the room, standing still with his arms folded. Once Keith was certain the room was free of bugs he disabled the function on his phone and Lance raised both eyebrows.

"Yeah, I don't use beds much for sleeping either," Lance said. Keith shot him a confused look and Lance made an exasperated sound, then took himself to the chair and sat down. "Okay, fine," he said. "So you and Shiro know what the fuck is really going on, not any of this alien business, but I don't really care about that. Is the weapon a nuke? Is that what all the secrecy is about?"

Keith was still staring at Lance, clearly confused. "It's ... not a nuke," he said. "It's a piece of alien tech, I don't know a lot of the details."

"Yeah, okay," Lance said. "We're sticking with that story, whatever. How are we gonna find it?"

Keith held up his phone, which contained a rough map and coordinates. "This might not be exact, but its where the resonance was pointing," he said. "Once we find one, the others will resonate louder."

" _Others?_ "

Keith shrugged, and Lance groaned. "I should have just let you people shoot me," he said.

 

 


	13. Chapter 13

"Is my brother alive?" Pidge asked, her voice level. That wasn't the first question that Allura expected to be asked, she knew, but the obvious was in the open at the moment, and frankly while Pidge was quite vindicated that there was _definitely_ more going on under the surface than she'd even begun to calculate, she had her priorities.

The room that the two guards had escorted them to was not a prison cell. She'd expected a brig or something of the sort, instead they were taken to a fully-furnished suite. It was mildly disconcerting, in the midst of some kind of clearly military endeavor that someone would take the time to furnish multiple rooms in plush comfort, but she wasn't going to take the time to question it. She'd seen a lot of mercenary folk dump funds into the strangest avenues and it wasn't the weirdest thing she'd come across in a mission as of yet, anyway.

Not that Pidge had a wide range of data with which to compare, usually the team member who got captured was Lance, and they had to go rescue _him_. If she had the opportunity she was going to grill him about the decorating choices of the various underworld kingpins that he had run afoul of so far.

They were left alone in the room, the two purple-skinned guards closing the double doors firmly behind them. Allura stood in the entrance of the suite, a far-off expression on her face that left Pidge a bit off balance, so she walked to the drape-covered windows and pulled aside the heavy curtain. There were no windows behind the fabric – just lights meant to simulate the shape of one. Pidge let the fabric fall back into place and turned around, looking back at Allura.

"I don't know," Allura said finally. "I don't know anything about him, Pidge."

"Bullshit you don't," Pidge said, and clenched her fists at her side. "I'm sick of the lies, tell me what you know, now!"

"You're in the wrong business then," Allura murmured, and Pidge felt the flush hit her face hard. Angry at herself for letting the emotion even get to her, Pidge half-turned away, looking along the length of the wall. There were several sets of draperies – more false windows – and a fireplace that was also, undoubtedly, false. Before the fireplace was a pair of couches and several chairs; and the room opened up further to the left, showing the corner of a spacious bed. Allura crossed the room and seated herself demurely on the couch. "I never lied about my goals," she said as she slipped off her heels and left them lay on the floor. "Or the mission. Only my nature, and only there by omission."

Pidge snorted, and folded her arms. "I don't give a shit about any of this alien crap." Allura's head shot up then, her face betraying her surprise. "I'm not _stupid_ ," Pidge said. "It's aliens all the way 'round, isn't it? That's why we hadn't heard of Sendak, that's why my algorithms couldn't recognize the cipher Hunk copied down, that's why you were so eager to get out of town fast." She sighed a bit, and shook her head. "I should have put it all together sooner."

Allura took off her earrings, one after the other, and left the glittering rock jewelry on the table between the couches. "You wouldn't have put it together," Allura said, sounding very confident in that. "No one has, not without being told." She held out her wrist, now bare without the teal-inset bracelet. She inspected her skin, looking for bruising. When Pidge remained silent, she looked up at her and found that Pidge was watching her with a peculiar expression.

"You're rather calm," Pidge said.

Allura looked toward the entrance of the suite, a set of double doors. "We're in a great position," she said. "Sendak just took us straight into the center of his camp. We can cripple his operation from the inside." Her expression had hardened into something unrecognizable, almost grotesque. "If we destroy the resonator -- or even better, his power source – that will slow him down considerably."

"Or, you know," Pidge said. "We could kill him."

"That was implied," Allura said, and then looked back to Pidge. "I swear I don't know anything about your brother, Pidge. He was long separated from Shiro when we freed Shiro from Sendak all those months ago."

Pidge said, quietly, "Sendak had Shiro?"

There was a bare moment of hesitation, as if Allura realized she had let something slip that shouldn't have been said. Then she nodded her head.

"They've been on Earth for a while, haven't they? What would they want with Shiro? Or Matt?" Pidge's voice cracked just slightly on her brother's name.

"I don't know," Allura said.

"Shiro didn't tell you _anything_?" Pidge said. Allura stared at Pidge, and Pidge looked away. She'd let her emotions run high and hot for too long, and was forgetting some very basic things that had been drilled into her at the Garrison. One of which was the assumption that there was _always_ someone listening. "Fine," she scoffed quietly, more to herself than to Allura, but Allura's head tilted just slightly, indicating that she heard anyway. Pidge sighed; those ears were ridiculous.

There were more important things to focus on, anyway.

 

* * *

 

The jeep banged along the unpaved road, striking just about every rock and pit in that existed. Keith would have assumed that Lance was getting back at him if not for the fact that Lance kept swearing under his breath every time they hit something. As it was, Keith kept one hand looped in the fabric 'oh shit' handle on the passenger side and a tight grip on his phone with the other. "How are we doing?" Lance asked, a split-second before they hit a very large hole masked by downed leaves and brush. Even with the seatbelts, Keith felt his hair scrape the canvas roof of the jeep. Lance swore again.

"Not far," Keith said. "Maybe twenty klicks." He shifted his hand to the interior frame of the jeep. "The resonance keeps echoing at the same frequency, so we've at least got that in our back pocket if we get lost and the GPS goes to shit."

Lance grunted an acknowledgment, too focused on driving to take the bait and dial up his snark level with Keith. Keith glanced sidelong at him, then returned his attention to the phone itself. "What are the odds this thing is still there?" Lance asked, as the shocks on the jeep barely did their job once more. "I mean, how long ago was it hidden? A decade or so? We talking pre-recent conflicts? Cold War?" Keith was silent, and Lance spared a split-second glance away from what could be jokingly called a road. "Do you even know how long it's been there?"

"Long," Keith said.

Lance was silent. "If it's from before World War II it's not going to be useful," Lance stared at the road out ahead of them. "Not at all. In fact it would probably just be dangerous to us because it's so old, which means the only reason we're racing these other guys for it is because it contains nukes or something worse."

"It's Altean," Keith finally relented, just a little. "And it's at least a thousand years old, if not older than that. I'm one hundred percent certain it holds up better than your random military crap that's barely a fraction of its age."

"Nuclear alien tech that's older than half the countries on the map," Lance said. "And this is the _good_ plan? What were we relying on as a plan 'B'?" More silence from Keith, because he was tired and pissed and _really_ didn't want to be trapped in a jeep trawling the foothills of a mountain with _Lance_ but Shiro had looked to him to complete this facet of their mission and dammit if there was one person on this lousy planet that Keith was still loyal to it was Shiro. He exhaled through clenched teeth and tried to ignore Lance's barbs.

A distinct lack of reaction from Keith meant that Lance let the issue drop for at least a little bit to concentrate on where they were going. The jeep was a rental from some tourist company who provided guided tours; Keith had pressed three times the going rate in cash into the guide's hands and said 'enjoy your day off'. This meant that while it was well suited to go up and down the regular paved roads, it was hardly a proper military vehicle and was doubtless unused to being driven at this speed off-road.

Not that any of that seemed to bother Lance at all.

Keith held on as they hit another bump, although this time Lance braked. The road was washed out a bit ahead, muddy water running thick through the trees. Keith frowned, it didn't look deep or even like it was moving; but Lance had a peculiar expression on his face as he stared out the windshield. "... and we're stopped," Keith said, but Lance didn't appear to have heard him, brow furrowed and concentrating. Then, without warning, Lance yanked the gearshift, throwing the jeep into reverse, and twisting the steering wheel so violently that Keith almost hit his head off the interior frame of the vehicle. " _Hey!_ "

"This way," Lance said, abandoning the unpaved road completely. Keith glanced back at the road, and then forward, suppressing the urge to duck as branches smacked off the windshield with painful regularity ... at least until they broke through the scrubbrush to find another unpaved road, in even _worse_ condition, running a bit parallel to where they were before.

"What the fuck, man," Keith said, as the resonance seemed to drag out and away. They were going the opposite direction. "Lance, you're a moron, we gotta go northeast."

"No," Lance said. "We don't. In fact, we don't want to go that way at all."

Keith held up the phone that showed the GPS map with the resonating location heading very quickly for a corner and off the map. When Lance didn't glance over, Keith huffed loudly. "Pull the jeep over, I'm driving."

Lance shook his head sharply. "No, we – we don't want to go that way. If we follow that thing, something bad's waiting there." He chewed his lip for a moment, concentrated on the road ahead of them, watching it slope up quickly but not quite gunning it, keeping the jeep at the same rate of speed. "It's a gut feeling, Keith. My gut doesn't steer me wrong."

"Oh really," Keith said sarcastically. "Your gut is steering us away from the fucking _resonance point, McClain._ "

"Dude, shut the fuck _up_ ," Lance snarled right back. "Trust me on this, okay? We need to go this way. I don't know why, but this is the right direction."

"Sure, fine," Keith said. "It's only the fate of the world that's at stake no biggie." He gripped the fabric handle tight as the road grew rockier, the trees starting to thin out a bit on either side of them. "You get to explain to Allura why we let Sendak's goons get to the resonance point before we did, though, got it?"

"The weapon's not at the resonance point," Lance said, a confidence in his voice that made Keith pause. "It's a decoy."

"Yeah?" Keith said. "And how do you know _that_?"

" _Trust me_ ," Lance said, and Keith scoffed but held on, glancing back down to his phone. The coordinates were gone off the map, now, and he looked up, through the windshield, at the road ahead.

"All right," Keith said reluctantly.

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
